Ed Gorman - Several Deaths Later

"Why's that?"

"He had something derogatory to say about each of them."

"But did he say anything at all about his argument with Todd Ames?"

"Just one thing and it didn't make much sense. He laughed when I asked him about it and he said 'Todd's just sick of payday.'"

"Payday? He didn't elaborate?"

"Huh-uh." She had some diet 7-Up. He watched her lips. They were wonderful lips, full and rich as a seventeenth-century Italian countess. "But, you know, Tobin, I don't think any of them like each other."

"Any of 'Celebrity Circle?'"

"Right."

"What makes you say that?"

"That's why I'm half-bombed."

"Why?"

"Drinking with Cassie McDowell. She wasn't as blunt as Ken, of course-when we were drinking this afternoon-but any time I'd mention any of the cast, I'd sense this coldness come over her." She gave him a cute little half-frown. "I'm glad secretaries get along better than celebrities." He could see the alcohol begin to fade from her gaze. She had some more 7-Up. "Anyway, she sure asked me a lot of questions."

"About what?"

"If a redheaded woman was following us or anything."

"A redheaded woman?"

"Yes."

"Did she say who the woman was?"

"No."

"Was a redheaded woman following you?"

"Not following us exactly. But I remember coming around the corner of the lounge-I really felt proud of myself, Tobin, being on Ken's arm and all-and there was a middle-aged woman, a nice-looking one with a large beauty mark on her right cheek, standing alone by the deck, smoking a cigarette and just watching us. When we passed her, Ken muttered some kind of name under his breath, and the woman gave him this really… arrogant's the only word I can think of… this real arrogant smile. Like she knew something really bad about Ken and he knew she knew it."

"But she didn't say anything?"

"No."

"Hmmm. Have you seen her around today?"

"No. But then I haven't been any place really except my cabin and the casino. And the only reason I went there was because Cassie came and got me."

"Oh, she got you?"

"Yes."

"She really wanted some information."

"Yeah, now that I think about it, I guess she did."

Tobin stood up. "How about dinner tonight?"

"You're leaving me?"

"Does that mean yes?"

She smiled her midwestern girl smile and he loved it. "Yes, it means yes, but why are you leaving?"

"I need to see a couple of people."

"Who?"

"The captain for one." Then it was his turn to smile. "And a redheaded woman with a beauty mark on her right cheek."

He walked past the aerobics class, making note of the various expensive aerobic suits and of the bodies inside the suits, and the disco music and the soft, warm ocean breeze made him feel younger and more powerful than he had in a long time.

The captain was in some sort of meeting and would not see him, and bribing four different stewards turned up not a single red-haired woman. "We have six hundred and five cabins, sir. That's a lot of passengers," one steward explained, stuffing Tobin's ten-dollar bill into his pocket.

Tobin went back to his own cabin and fast-forwarded through two videos. He doubted he was missing much with Biker Girls on Mars or his least favorite actor, Dustin Hoffman, doing Hedda Gabler and playing, a la his famous Tootsie turn, Hedda herself.

Finished with these two, Tobin then counted the stack of unseen videos in the corner. Twenty-six more to race through before the cruise ended. Starting inevitably to feel guilty about the short shrift he gave even films such as Halloween High, he fortunately saw among the remaining tapes by Val Lewton, John Ford, William Freidkin, Don Seigel, and Ida Lupino-a very good director as well as actress-a few movies he really wanted to see.

But for now, tired, he napped.

He wasn't sure how long he'd been asleep before he heard the screaming just outside his cabin door.

Jumping from bed, grabbing his pants and getting into them the way he'd been forced once when an angry husband had been pounding up the stairs, Tobin ran to his door and threw it open.

There, pushed back against the rail, two women struggled over a small brown leather notebook one of them held. Tobin wasn't sure which one owned the thing-all he knew was that the two resembled TV wrestlers, impressive to watch but ineffective.

Tobin, rubbing sleep from his face, walked over to them. Out on the rim of the vast ocean you could see the round yellow sun begin slowly to sink, and closer by a steamer, gray and industrial, chopped through the calm water.

Other passengers had responded to the screams as well and had now tumbled out of their cabins, watching the two women as Tobin approached them.

"Anything wrong?"

It was a silly question and he knew it instantly but he was too sleepy to care.

He pushed himself between the two women and their wrestling ceased.

The dark-haired, slightly pudgy woman he knew, because she was Jere Farris's wife.

Her opponent-a red-haired woman who would have been beautiful if not for a certain hardness in her Katharine Hepburn gaze-he assumed was the one Cindy McBain had told him about. She had a beauty mark on her right cheek. It was a real beauty mark and a nice one.

The redhead snapped the notebook to her breast, then jammed it quickly into her purse, which she snapped shut with the finality of a bank vault closing for the night.

"You bitch," Alicia Farris said. She was a fortyish woman who knew how to dress for her somewhat hefty size, her clothes running to loose and expensive garments that managed to be both sedate and stylish. She was probably fifty pounds overweight but managed to look only twenty. Her face, with good if broad bones, was beautifully made up and her gray eyes were lovely. Among "Celebrity Circle" members, the joke was that Jere was her male clone, and it was true that she did give the impression of managing him rather than being married to him. But Tobin had had drinks with her a few times and found her bright and funny without being cruel or bitchy, something that could not be said about many show-biz wives who stayed home and sharpened knives while hubby went out and dazzled the masses.

"You mind if I ask what's going on, Alicia?" Tobin said.

"It's this bitch, Iris Graves!"

Iris only smiled, as if she were quite used to being called names.

"Anyway, I'm afraid it isn't your business," Alicia said. Then, more softly, "It really isn't, Tobin." She didn't take her eyes off the redhead.

Then Alicia, conscious suddenly of the other passengers watching her, pushed past Tobin and moved on down the deck, her black high heels sharp against the decking, leaving Tobin standing next to the woman.

Her blessings were bountiful, as her tight white T-shirt and stone-washed jeans revealed. And in addition to her somewhat overwhelming body, which managed to combine the spectacular with the graceful, she had very green eyes and cute little ears bearing giant loops of gold, and teeth so white they had to be capped but weren't. Only the imperiousness of her gaze troubled him. Perhaps, in a previous life, she'd been Benito Mussolini.

She turned to go and Tobin put a hand on her arm.

She glanced at him as if he'd just mooched a quarter. "I don't like being touched," she said.

"What's so important about that notebook?"

"My God, do you really expect me to answer that?" She sounded genuinely shocked.

"And why are you following Cassie McDowell?"

She looked at him and shook her head. "I've watched your show so I know you are stupid, Mr. Tobin. I just didn't know how stupid."

A few of the onlookers laughed at her remark. They also watched admiringly as she walked away.

One sunburned seventy-year-old in red Bermuda shorts and a green short-sleeved shirt said to Tobin, "Are you always that lucky with women?"