Mary Clark - Weep No More, My Lady

It was the copy machine that seemed to intrigue him most. "The window was open. The machine was on." He stood in front of it. "She was about to copy something. She looked out the window, and then what? She felt dizzy? She wandered outside? But where was she trying to go?" He stared out the window. This view took in the expanse of the north lawn, the scattered bungalows along the way to the Olympic pool and the Roman bath-that god-awful monstrosity!

"You say every inch of the grounds, every building was searched?"

"Yes." Helmut answered first. "I personally saw to it."

Scott cut him off. "We'll start all over."

Elizabeth spent the next hours at Sammy's desk. Her fingers were dry from handling the dozens of letters she examined. They read alike-requests for Leila's autograph, requests for her picture. There was so far no sign of any more anonymous letters.

At two o'clock Elizabeth heard a shout. She raced to the window in time to see one of the policemen gesturing from the door of the bathhouse. Her feet flew on the stairs. At the next-to-last step, she tripped and fell, smashing her arms and legs against the polished tiles. Heedless of the sharp sting in her palms and knees, she ran across the lawn to the bathhouse, arriving as Scott disappeared inside. She followed him through the locker room into the pool area.

A policeman was standing at the side of the pool pointing down at Sammy's crumpled body.

Later, she vaguely remembered kneeling beside Sammy, reaching her hand to brush back the matted, bloody hair from her forehead, feeling Scott's iron grasp, hearing his sharp command: "Don't touch her!" Sammy's eyes were open, her features frozen in terror, her glasses still caught on her ears but dropped down on her nose, her palms outstretched as though pushing something back. Her beige cardigan was still buttoned, the wide patch pockets suddenly prominent. "See if she has the letter to Leila," Elizabeth heard herself say. "Look in the pockets." Then her own eyes widened. The beige wool cardigan became Leila's white satin pajamas, and she was kneeling over Leila's body again… Mercifully, she fainted.

When she regained consciousness, she was lying on the bed in her bungalow. Helmut was bending over her, holding something that smelled harsh and pungent under her nostrils. Min was chafing her hands. Uncontrollable sobs racked her body, and she heard herself wailing, "Not Sammy too, not Sammy too."

Min held her tightly. " Elizabeth, don't… Don't."

Helmut muttered, "This will help you." The prick of a needle in her arm.

When she awoke, the shadows were long in the room. Nelly, the maid who had helped in the search, was touching her shoulder. "I'm so sorry to disturb you, miss," she said, "but I did bring tea and something for you to eat. The sheriff can't wait any longer. He has to talk with you."

The news of Dora's death rippled through the Spa like an unwelcome rainstorm at a family picnic. There was mild curiosity: "What ever was she doing wandering in that place?" A sense of mortality: "How old was she, did you say?" An attempt to place her-"Oh, you mean that prim little woman in the office?"-then a quick return to the pleasant activities of the Spa. This was, after all, an extremely expensive retreat. One came here to escape problems, not find them.

In mid-afternoon Ted had gone for a massage, hoping to obtain some relief from tension in the pounding hands of the Swedish masseur. He'd just returned to his bungalow when Craig told him the news. "They found her body in the bathhouse. She must have gotten dizzy and fallen."

Ted thought of the afternoon in New York when Sammy had had that first stroke. They were all in Leila's apartment, and in the middle of a sentence Sammy's voice had trailed off. It was he who had realized there was something seriously wrong.

"How is Elizabeth taking it?" he asked Craig.

"Pretty badly. I gather she fainted."

"She was close to Sammy. She…" Ted bit his lip and changed the subject. "Where's Bartlett?"

"On the golf course."

"I wasn't aware I brought him out here to play golf."

"Ted, come off it! He's been on the job since early this morning. Henry claims he can think better if he gets some exercise."

"Remind him that I go on trial next week. He'd better curtail his exercise." Ted shrugged. "It was crazy to come here. I don't know why I thought it would help me calm down; it's not working."

"Give it a chance. It wouldn't be any better in New York or Connecticut. Oh, I just bumped into your old friend Sheriff Alshorne."

"Scott's here? Then they must think there's something peculiar about Sammy's death."

"I don't know about that. It's probably just routine for him to show up."

"Does he know I'm here?"

"Yes. As a matter of fact, he asked about you."

"Did he suggest that I call him?"

Craig's hesitation was barely perceptible. "Well, not exactly-but look, it wasn't a social conversation."

Another person avoiding me, Ted thought. Another person waiting to see the full evidence laid out in court. Restlessly he wandered around the living room of his bungalow. Suddenly it had become a cage to him. But all rooms had seemed like that since the indictment. It must be a psychological reaction. "I'm going for a walk," he said abruptly. Then, to forestall Craig's offer of company, he added, "I'll be back in time for dinner."

As he passed the Pebble Beach Lodge, he wondered at the sense of isolation that made him feel so totally apart from the people who wandered along the paths, heading for the restaurants, the tourist shops, the golf courses. His grandfather had started bringing him to these courses when he was eight. His father had detested California, and so when they came it was just his mother and himself, and he'd seen her shed her nervous mannerisms and become younger, lighthearted.

Why hadn't she left his father? he wondered. Her family didn't have the Winters millions, but she would certainly have had enough money. Wasn't it because she was afraid of losing custody of him that she'd stayed in that cursed marriage? His father had never let her forget that first suicide attempt. And so she had stayed and endured his periodic drunken rages, his verbal abuse, his mimicking of her mannerisms, his scorn of her private fears until one night she had decided she couldn't endure any more.

Unseeingly, Ted walked along the Seventeen Mile Drive, unaware of the Pacific, glimmering and gleaming below the houses that rose above Stillwater Cove and Carmel Bay, unaware of the luxuriant bougainvillea, heedless of the expensive cars that sped past him.

Carmel was still crowded with summer tourists, college students getting in one last fling before the fall semester. When he and Leila walked through town, she'd stopped traffic. The thought made him pull his sunglasses from his pocket. In those days, men used to look at him with envy. Now he was aware of hostility on the faces of strangers who recognized him.

Hostility. Isolation. Fear.

These last seventeen months had disrupted his entire life, had forced him to do things he would not have believed possible. Now he accepted the fact that there was one more monumental hurdle he had to overcome before the trial.

Drenching perspiration soaked his body at the image of what that would be.

Alvirah sat at the dressing table in her bungalow, happily surveying the shiny rows of creams and cosmetics that had been presented to her in the makeup class that afternoon. As the instructor had told her, she had flat cheekbones that could be beautifully enhanced with a soft blush rather than the crimson rouge she favored. She also had been persuaded to try wearing a brown mascara instead of the jet black which she believed drew attention to her eyes. "Less is better," the makeup expert had assured her, and truth to tell, there was a difference. In fact, Alvirah decided, the new makeup, combined with the way they'd toned down her hair to a rich brown, made her look just like the way she remembered Aunt Agnes, and Agnes always was the beauty in the family. It also felt good that her hands were starting to lose their calluses. No more heavy cleaning for her. Ever. Period. "And if you think you look good now, wait till you see how glamorous you are when Baron von Schreiber is finished with you," the makeup lady had said. "His collagen injections will make those little lines around your mouth, nose and forehead disappear. It's almost miraculous."