Marcia Talley: The Last Refuge

Four steps forward, join both hands, turn, turn. ‘I didn’t really think Cornell would try anything here in a room full of people, anyway.’ Paul sounded confident, but then he didn’t know Drew as well as Amy – and I – did.’ Four steps back.

It was a fragmented conversation, but between the do-see-dos, allemande left and rights, and the promenades, I explained about the note Drew had left in the bottle. ‘I wanted to warn you, call off our plan before somebody got hurt.’

Paul laughed. ‘Why do you think I spent all these years practicing karate?’

‘Karate? Ha! Drew’s a SEAL. He probably knows Krav Maga,’ I said, naming the terrifying, no-holds barred method of self-defense developed by the Israelis.

The music ended, and Paul escorted me back to where Amy was standing alone, looking around nervously. I introduced her to my husband.

Paul took her hand, raised it to his lips and gave it a gallant kiss. ‘Delighted.’ He gave Amy the good news/bad news about Drew, and I watched as the tension gradually drained from her face.

‘What now?’ she asked.

‘It’s time to enjoy the ball, Miss Cornell.’

‘They can’t let Drew get away with murdering Alex, Professor. No matter what the medical examiner says, I know he did it.’

Paul tucked Amy’s hand under his arm, covered it with his own. ‘And there’s something else they’re going to take into consideration, Amy. Drew’s unauthorized action in Swosa may have resulted in the deaths of his ten teammates, plus a well-trained dog named Cody.’

‘A dog, too?’ Amy blinked back tears.

The music had started again. ‘Shall we dance?’ my husband asked his young companion, and before she even answered, he whisked Amy away.

I watched from the sidelines.

For the first reel, Paul flirted, Amy was coy. By the second, Paul held on to Amy’s hand just a second too long; Amy was a coquette. They called a country dance, and by then, Amy was behaving like a card-carrying colonial vamp and I had found a chair, where I seethed quietly. Paul was a damn good actor, but then, he was wearing actor’s clothing.

‘Whew!’ Amy trilled when the music finally ended, loud enough for me – and for everyone within a ten mile radius – to hear. ‘I could certainly use a drink, Professor Ives.’

Paul bowed in my direction – the showoff – and escorted Amy into the banquet room.

Meanwhile, another dance had begun. Michael took pity on me – he must have thought Paul had lost his mind, but was kind enough not to say so – and I danced with the superintendant, too.

After a time, Paul rejoined me, minus Amy.

‘What was that all about?’ I snapped.

Paul leaned close. ‘Are you acting,’ he whispered, ‘or are you really pissed off at me?’

I didn’t answer that. ‘Where’s Amy?’

‘In the ladies’ room.’

‘Oh.’ After a moment of silence I said, ‘The superintendant saw you acting like an asshole, you know.’

Paul snorted softly. ‘I’ll explain it all to him later.’

‘Better you than me.’

‘I thought Amy needed cheering up, Hannah. You’d need cheering up, too, if you’d just learned that I’d been arrested.’

‘I simply don’t get where Drew is coming from,’ I said. ‘I know he was determined not to leave without Amy, but it would have been a whole lot safer waiting for her while windsurfing off some beach in Buenos Aires, instead of stirring up trouble here. Look where it got him.’

‘Methinks madam could use a drink. Punch?’

‘Yes, please.’ I felt my makeup crackle, so I suspected I was frowning. But I could use a drink. By that time the ballroom was hot, filled to capacity with merry-makers. The great doors on both ends of the long hall stood open, but there was too little breeze passing through them to even begin to cool the room.

In the banquet room, a group of gentlemen, a little worse for wear due to the bottomless characteristic of the punch bowl, could be heard toasting everyone in Christendom in voices loud enough to be picked up by a passing space shuttle. To the king, long may he reign. To the queen. To Barack Obama. To his wife, Michelle. To wives in general, and to girlfriends, past, present and future. To absent friends.

Even the card games were getting rowdy, and I suspected that whist had taken a second seat to poker, although I didn’t know what the players would be using for chips.

Somewhere someone began singing, ‘Whiskey in the Jar,’ only to be drowned out by someone else belting out ‘Yankee Doodle’ in a drunken baritone.

I was certain that the following day, the Capital would report that a good time was had by all.

A jig was called, and somebody said, ‘May I?’

The guy was in his mid-thirties, I guessed. Solid, tan, fit. He wore the red and white uniform of a Maryland militiaman. I couldn’t tell the color of his hair because it was tucked under a fashionable wig.

‘Have we met?’ I asked, as I offered him my hand.

My partner smiled enigmatically, his green eyes twinkling in the candlelight as he led me out of the banquet room and onto the dance floor.

The jig began. Using a kind of two-step, we jigged around each other for a bit, until another dancer cut in. I jigged with the newcomer for a while, fearing that the old guy – a long-time senator from the Eastern Shore – might drop dead of a heart attack, until I had the opportunity to jig away and cut in on someone else. Eventually my younger partner found me again. ‘I’m Hannah,’ I said, my voice bobbly. ‘What’s yours?’

‘Ed,’ he said.

‘Hello, Ed.’ Dancers jigged all around us, whooping and laughing. I was beginning to relax, getting swept up in their merriment, too. Perspiration sheened the faces of every gentleman on the dance floor, ran in rivulets between my breasts, but I didn’t care.

At one point I pivoted and noticed Paul watching me, holding two glasses of punch, one in each hand and looking worried. I waved at my husband, grinned, and jigged madly on. What’s good for the goose, et cetera, et cetera.

All of a sudden, Ed laughed, grabbed both my hands, and jigged me, bobbing and weaving, through a clot of dancers, toward the enormous bronze doors that led from the twentieth-century annex to the porch on the Lawyer’s Mall side of the building. Party-going couples relaxed on benches in the alcoves on either side of the doors, so my partner steered me out onto the porch. ‘It’s hot, Hannah. Let’s get some fresh air.’

I reclaimed my hands and fell back against one of the six massive columns that supported the roof of the porch. ‘Whew!’ I flipped open my fan. ‘What a workout!’

Ed took a step, closing the distance between us. I held out my fan to signal keep-away, but he kept advancing.

Using one arm, he hooked me around the waist and pulled me close. His lips were warm and moist against my ear. ‘Let’s make Paul jealous, shall we?’

I recognized his voice then. Cold. Bitter. Pitiless.

My heart flopped, flopped again. Drew. ‘I heard that you’d been detained. How did you get away?’

He jerked me closer. ‘Rent-a-cops. Don’t make me laugh.’

He jerked me again.

‘Drew, don’t.’ If it hadn’t been for my corset, I think he might have broken my back.

Where the hell was Paul? He’d seen me dancing with Drew, he had to have noticed when Drew dragged me outside. Or had Paul been too distracted, making goo-goo eyes at Amy?

‘It’s over, Drew. The Navy knows that you’re alive,’ I hissed.

His forehead was pressed against mine. He shook his head, slowly, dangerously. ‘Who told them that? You? Or the imbeciles that tried to arrest me outside your house?’