Mary Clark - Weep No More, My Lady

Ted stood on the beach, staring at the house, seeing his mother and grandmother on the porch, seeing his grandparents at his mother's funeral, hearing his grandfather say, "We should have made her leave him."

His grandmother whispered, "She wouldn't leave him-it would have meant giving up Ted."

Had it been his fault? he wondered as a child. He still asked himself the same question. There was still no answer.

There was someone watching him from a window. Quickly he continued to jog down the beach.

Bartlett and Craig were waiting in his bungalow. They'd already had breakfast. He went to the phone and ordered juice, toast, coffee. "I'll be right back," he told them. He showered and put on shorts and a T-shirt. The tray was waiting when he came out. "Quick service here, isn't it? Min really knows how to run a spa! It would have been a good idea to franchise this place for new hotels."

Neither man answered him. They sat at the library table watching him, seeming to know that he neither expected nor wanted comment. He swallowed the orange juice in one gulp and reached for the coffee. "I'm going to the spa for the morning," he said. "I might as well have a decent workout. We'll leave for New York tomorrow. Craig, call an emergency board meeting for Saturday morning. I'm resigning as president and chairman of the company, and appointing you in my place."

His expression warned Craig not to argue. He turned to Bartlett, his eyes ice-cold. "I've decided to plea-bargain, Henry. Give me the best and worst possible scenarios of what kind of sentence I can expect to get."

Elizabeth was still in bed when Vicky brought in her breakfast tray. She set it down next to the bed and studied Elizabeth. "You're not feeling well."

Elizabeth propped her pillows against the headboard and sat up. "Oh, I guess I'll survive." She attempted a smile. "One way or another, we have to, don't we?" She reached over and picked up the vase with the single flower from the tray. "What's that you always say about carrying roses to fading flowers?"

"I don't mean you." Vicky's angular face softened. "I was off the last two days. I just heard about Miss Samuels. What a nice lady she was. But will you tell me what she was doing in the bathhouse? She once told me just looking at that place gave her the creeps. She said it reminded her of a tomb. Even if she wasn't feeling well, that would be the last place she'd go…"

After Vicky left, Elizabeth picked up the schedule that was on the breakfast tray. She hadn't intended to go to the Spa for either treatments or exercise, but changed her mind. She was slated for a massage with Gina at ten o'clock. Employees talk. Just now Vicky had underscored her own belief that Sammy would never have gone into the bathhouse on her own. When she had arrived on Sunday and had the massage, Gina had gossiped about the financial problems of the Spa. She might be able to hear more gossip if she asked the right questions.

As long as she was going there, Elizabeth decided to go through the full schedule. The first exercise class helped her to limber up, but it was hard not to look across the room to the place in the front row where Alvirah Meehan had been the other day. She had labored so hard to bend and twist that at the end of the class she had been puffing furiously, her face bright red. "But I kept up!" she had told Elizabeth proudly.

She ran into Cheryl in the corridor leading to the facial rooms. Cheryl was wrapped in a terry-cloth robe. Her finger- and toenails were painted a brilliant bluish-pink. Elizabeth would have passed her without speaking, but Cheryl grasped her arm. " Elizabeth, I've got to talk to you."

"About what?"

"Those poison-pen letters. Is there any chance of finding any more of them?" Without waiting for an answer, she rushed on: "Because if you have any more, or find any more, I want them analyzed, or tested, or fingerprinted, or whatever you and the world of science can do to trace them back to the sender. I did not send them ! Got it?"

Elizabeth watched her sweep down the corridor. As Scott had commented, she sounded convincing. On the other hand, if she was reasonably sure that those last two letters were the only ones likely to be found, it would be the perfect attitude for her to take. How good an actress was Cheryl?

At ten o'clock Elizabeth was on the massage table. Gina came into the room. "Pretty big excitement around this place," she commented.

"I would say so."

Gina wrapped Elizabeth 's hair in a plastic cap. "I know. First Miss Samuels, then Mrs. Meehan. It's crazy." She poured cream on her hands and began to massage Elizabeth 's neck. "The tension's there again. This has been a lousy time for you. I know you and Miss Samuels were close."

It was easier not to talk about Sammy. She managed to murmur, "Yes, we were," then asked, "Gina, did you ever have Mrs. Meehan for a treatment?"

"Sure did. Monday and Tuesday. She's some character. What happened to her?"

"They're not sure. They're trying to check her medical history."

"I'd have thought she was sound as a dollar. A little chunky, but good skin tone, good heartbeat, good breathing. She was scared of needles, but that doesn't give anyone cardiac arrest."

Elizabeth felt the soreness in her shoulders as Gina's fingers kneaded the tight muscles.

Gina laughed ruefully. "Do you think there was anyone in the Spa who didn't know Mrs. Meehan was having a collagen injection in treatment room C? One of the girls overheard her ask Cheryl Manning if she'd ever had collagen there. Can you imagine?"

"No, I can't. Gina, the other day you told me the Spa hasn't been the same since Leila died. I know she attracted the celebrity-watchers, but the Baron used to bring in a pretty healthy bunch of new faces every year."

Gina poured more cream into her palms. "It's funny. About two years ago that dried up. Nobody can figure out why. He was making enough trips, but most of them were in the New York area. Remember, he used to work the charity balls in a dozen major cities, personally present the certificate for a week at the Spa to whoever came up with the winning ticket, and by the time he got finished talking, the lucky winner had three of her friends going along for the ride-as paying guests."

"Why do you think it stopped?"

Gina lowered her voice. "He was up to something. No one could figure out what-including Min, I guess… She started to travel with him a lot. She was getting plenty worried that His Royal Highness, or whatever he calls himself, had something going in New York…"

Something going ? As Gina kneaded and pounded her body, Elizabeth fell silent. Was that something a play called Merry-Go-Round ? And if so, had Min guessed the truth long ago?

Ted left the Spa at eleven o'clock. After two hours of using the Nautilus equipment and swimming laps, he'd had a massage and then sat in one of the private open-air Jacuzzis that dotted the enclosure of the men's spa. The sun was warm; there was no breeze; a flock of cormorants drifted overhead, like a floating black cloud in an otherwise cloudless sky.

Waiters were setting up for lunch service on the patio. The striped umbrellas in soft tones of lime green and yellow that shaded the tables complemented the colorful slates on the ground.

Again Ted was aware of how well the place was run. If things were different, he'd put Min and the Baron in charge of creating a dozen Cypress Point Spas all over the world. He almost smiled. Not completely in charge-all the Baron's proposed expenditures would be monitored by a hawk-eyed accountant.

Bartlett had probably been on the phone with the district attorney. By now he would have some idea of the kind of sentence he might expect. It still seemed absolutely incredible. Something he had no memory of doing had forced him to become a totally different person, had forced him to lead a totally different life.