Aaron Elkins: Uneasy Relations

“I want to be in on it too,” Julie declared.

“Then come on along.”

Fausto’s mouth formed to say, “In on what?” but Gideon wasn’t waiting for them. He was striding after Buck. Fausto and Julie looked at each other, shrugged, and hurried after him. “What the hell,” Fausto sighed to himself.

Buck’s destination – and Gideon’s – was a gaggle of people clustered near one end of the pool, next to the roast beef buffet. There Audrey, Corbin, Adrian, and Pru, drinks in hand, were bunched around Lester and a frazzled if happy-looking Rowley, who was accepting their compliments and congratulations.

Gideon waited until there was an opening in the conversation, at which point his silent, waiting presence was sensed. They turned expectantly.

“Rowley,” Gideon said as casually as he could manage, “didn’t I hear you saying something the other night about doing an archaeological site survey on the west side?”

“It’s quite possible,” Rowley said. “I do them with some frequency. It goes with my job. Why do you ask?”

“This would have been, oh, a year or two ago – 2005, I think. It was during that Europa Point retrospective that they had here.”

Rowley removed his pipe and tapped his lower lip with it. “Mmm.. . you know, I think you’re correct. I believe I was evaluating a potential sewer construction site near Casemates Square. Nothing came of it, though. They went right ahead and installed the sewer.”

“No,” said Gideon, “it couldn’t have been Casemates Square. You said it was on the west side of the Rock.”

“Did I? Hmm, well, I do a lot of them, you know.” He was beginning to get edgy. “What’s the difference? Why do you ask?”

“It was Catalan Bay, wasn’t it?” Pru said. “I’m sure that’s what you told us.”

Fausto and Gideon exchanged a quick, extremely meaningful look. Gideon could almost hear the click in Fausto’s head. Catalan Bay.

“Catalan Bay?” Rowley coughed softly. “Yes, by George, I believe you’re right. Now that I think of it, it was-”

“Mr. Boyd,” Fausto said, “I think you and I should have a little talk.”

“A talk,” Rowley repeated dully. A muscle below his eye twitched erratically. He brushed at it is if he could sweep it from his skin. “Of course, if you like, but this is hardly the time. What is this about, Chief Inspector?”

The others had become quiet as well, and intent, sensing something in the air.

“I think it’d be better if we talked privately,” Fausto said.

“You mean it can’t wait? We’re right in the middle of a party.”

“Probably best to take care of it now.”

Scared as he was, Rowley stood his ground. “No, sir, I demand to know what it’s about.”

“Yeah, I demand to know,” put in Lester, who could have had no possible idea of what was going on, but wasn’t one to pass up an opportunity for a little theater.

Patience had never been Fausto’s long suit. His lips tightened. “Okay, then, I got a couple of questions about some sticks of gelignite missing from a construction project at Catalan Bay.”

“And what is that supposed to have to do with me? Exactly what are you implying?” Despite the brave words, his voice was choked. He could hardly be heard. He had grown perceptibly paler, perceptibly more still. He knows it’s over, Gideon thought. He’s dying by inches.

Fausto, finished with cajoling, moved toward Rowley to reach for his arm, bringing Rowley suddenly to life. Twisting just out of Fausto’s grasp, he grabbed a shocked Audrey by the bun at the nape of her neck, quickly getting his arm around her spindly throat and jerking her up against him.

“Hey!” Buck cried, starting forward, but Fausto stopped him with an arm across his chest.

“Rowley, damn you, don’t be ridiculous,” Audrey snapped. “You know you’re not going to hurt me.” She tried to pull away his arm but couldn’t. Rowley wasn’t a big man, no more than five-eight, and not powerfully built, but Audrey, for all her lean sinewiness, was little more than five feet tall and weighed perhaps a hundred pounds soaking wet. It was hard for her to get any meaningful leverage.

“This isn’t going to do you any good,” Fausto said. “You gotta know that, Rowley.”

“If you come any nearer,” Rowley said in a choked voice, “I’ll kill her, I will.” He spat the pipe out onto the terrace.

It seemed too incredible, too histrionic, to be real. Some of the onlookers began to laugh, under the impression they’d been roped into one of those interactive murder mystery plays. But that impression was quickly dashed when Rowley snatched up a barbecue fork from the roast beef table and quickly pressed it against the side of Audrey’s neck, creating two little dents that immediately filled with blobs of blood. There was a collective gasp, a whispered chorus of “Oh, my God!” Audrey instantly stopped struggling and stood stone-still, her eyes open very wide, as if she were straining to listen for some faint and distant sound.

“Rowley, if you hurt her, I swear to God I’ll kill you,” Buck snarled, his voice husky and trembling with rage. There was little doubt he meant it.

“Rowley, come on, don’t you see you’re making it worse for yourself?” Fausto said reasonably. “Think about it a minute. Look, you haven’t hurt her yet. We can still sit down like reasonable people, you can call your solicitor-”

“Shut up!” Rowley said, or rather screamed. With that, even the people at the other end of the terrace became aware of what was happening. Conversation ceased. The musicians stopped playing. Many of the women had their hands to their mouths. All eyes were on Rowley and Audrey.

Rowley looked quickly behind him. A few people were standing between him and the double doors that led out to the elevators. “I don’t want anybody behind me,” he yelled. “Move out of the way!”

They quickly grasped the situation and retreated toward the walls, except for one wide-shouldered man who looked as if he intended to bar the way, but Fausto motioned him aside. “Do as he says, please. I’m a police officer.”

With reluctance, the man complied. Rowley began to move slowly backward with Audrey, keeping the fork pressed against her throat. Audrey moved with him, rigid and unresisting. The blood had begun to dribble down her neck in two streams. Gideon, along with everyone else, watched helplessly.

“Rowley,” Fausto began. “Mr. Boyd-”

“Shut up!” Rowley shrieked. “Just… shut… up!”

He looked quickly behind him again to make sure the way was clear, then continued backing toward the doors some thirty feet away.

Julie grasped Gideon’s forearm. “He doesn’t see the tub,” she whispered excitedly. “I don’t think he sees the tub!”

“The what?” Gideon asked, but even as he said it he saw what she was talking about. Not far behind Audrey and Rowley, between them and the elevators, there was a circular, ten-foot-wide hot tub sunk into the terrace floor. It was obvious that Rowley wasn’t aware of it; he was dragging Audrey directly toward it.

There were more whispers as the watchers pointed it out to one another. An electric ripple seemed to flow among them. They watched, transfixed, many holding their breath. Now they were eight feet away. .. now six… now four… two more steps and…

With his foot almost on the rim, Rowley sensed the crowd’s restiveness and twisted around to glance nervously behind him. As he did so, the points of the fork came a few inches away from Audrey’s neck, and she responded instantaneously. A hard whack in the ribs from her right elbow, an almost simultaneous one from the left, and then a scrape down his shin with the heel of her shoe, ending in a full-bodied stomp on his instep, all of it in the space of a second.