Diane Davidson - The Main Corpse

Stepping inside, I tried to prepare myself for the worst. If only I knew what the worst was, I reflected grimly. It was strangely heartening to sense a trace of Marla’s perfume in the air. In fact, the air in the house, surprisingly, was not three-day-old stale. I moved cautiously along the light blue Kirman runner into the front hall and sniffed again. Marla’s scent seemed to become stronger. So did the aroma of coffee.

Coffee? What the hell have I done? I wondered. She’s here with Tony and just not answering the phone. I’ve crashed in on a romantic interlude. She’ll never speak to me again, after this.

“Marla?” I ventured. “Hey, guys! Where are you? It’s Goldy. I’m here making a fool of myself because somebody said a bear got into your campground! Are you here?”

I fully expected to hear Marla’s familiar voice trill a sarcastic remark. Or perhaps her impish face and wild hair would appear and teasingly demand an explanation for my panicked behavior. Instead, I heard a tiny sound. Something hissed down the hall. I walked quickly toward it. Oddly, the kitchen floor was gritty with dried mud. The red light of the coffee machine blinked mockingly. Bubbles in the decanter bubbled and spat, producing both the scent and the sound I’d heard. I pulled the cord out of the wall and looked disconsolately around the room. I suddenly remembered something my mother used to do when she came home, and my brother and I looked guilty, and things in the kitchen didn’t look quite right. She would make a beeline for the trash bin. Whatever mischief we had made, whatever forbidden pizza or ice cream we had snitched, she figured, the telltale detritus was bound to be in the trash. I wrenched open the white cabinet and peered into the plastic garbage bag. It was filled with crumpled paper towels. I pulled one out. The towel was covered with dried blood.

“Marla!” I shouted. I threw down the towel and pawed through the trash. There was no meat tray or packaging to explain the bloodstained towels. I slammed out of the kitchen and ran up the back stairs, down the hall, and into her bedroom.

It was a disaster site. Clothes strewn on the beige carpeting. Towels draped over upholstered chairs. On her bed, the flowered bedcovers formed a mountainous tumble.

“Marla – ” I croaked, fully expecting a corpse under the sheets.

The covers moved. If there were two people under there, I would never live down the mortification. That is, if Marla didn’t murder me for being such a paranoid idiot. But it would serve them right for not answering the doorbell or my calls.

A half-full cup of coffee and opened container of pills sat on the dressing table. The bedside lamp was on. I stepped awkwardly toward the bed just as Marla’s snarled mop of hair appeared from under a tousled sheet. I gasped.

“Marla? What’s going on?”

An unearthly groan, full of shame and pain, issued from the rumpled bed. Then a batch of soiled towels emerged, then my best friend’s face. I gasped again. One black eye, the other swollen shut. A bruised cheek. A dark, bloody gash down her forehead. She levered herself carefully to a sitting position. She wore a sweatshirt spotted with blood, which she tugged down self-consciously before raising her face to try to look at me.

“No,” I moaned, dropping to my knees next to her. “Oh God, you need a doctor. What happened – “

“I wanted to call you, but the damn phone wasn’t working.” Her labored whisper squeezed my heart. “I’m sorry you have to … see me like this. I – “

I reached a hand out to her poor face but she pulled away. “Marla, please,” I said firmly. “I’m calling your cardiologist. Won’t you tell me what happened? We must call the police.” The words tumbled out. Anger made my ears buzz.

She groaned. “I was going to call the police in a little bit, anyway, if I couldn’t reach Tony. I don’t know if he got out, too. I don’t think he saw me … I’ve tried to reach him, but he’s not answering his machine. He’ll be so ticked off if we call the cops. More bad publicity for Prospect. Just give it half an hour,” she begged. She stifled a sob and reached for a tissue.

“Marla, please tell me what happened.”

“Somebody… I … I … think it might have been Albert… .” A sob shuddered through her. I put my hand on her forearm and waited for her to continue. She went on: “Actually, it started Friday night. Tony and I had a terrible fight.”

“Oh, no.” She groaned again, peered uncertainly around the room, then fastened her gaze on the coffee and pills at her bedside. She groped for the brown pill bottle. I leaned close to see what it was. The label read: Royce, Tony. Take one tablet orally every 4 hours as needed for pain. Acetaminophen with codeine.

“Oh, Marla, don’t take his prescription. What have you got it for, anyway?”

“He leaves his stuff here all the time. And he gets headaches. Actually, sometimes I think that guy is a – headache.”

“Marla – “

“Let me take some meds,” she insisted, “and then I’ll tell you what happened.” To my horror, she shook out not one but three pills, popped them into her mouth, then washed them down with cold coffee. She grimaced. Then she groaned and sank back onto the pillow.

“Wait,” I told her. “Let me get a washcloth for that eye.” When I came back, she had pressed her face into the pillows and refused to look at me. “Marla,” I implored, “don’t talk. You have to let me call Dr. Gordon. He’s going to want to see you right away. This is for your health, Marla. This is for your life.”

She moaned. Then she reached out and to my relief, took the cold washcloth I offered. When she had eased back upright, I found the bedroom phone, a gilt rotary contraption that was supposed to go with the French Provincial theme. My heart ached for her. She always tried to make everything beautiful. Miraculously, I remembered Dr. Gordon’s number. The phone rang once, twice. It was an emergency, I told the answering service. Did I need an ambulance, the woman wanted to know. In the mountain area, I knew emergency medical services were handled by a private company called Front Range Ambulance. With only two vehicles available, and almost twenty-four hours without phone service in the mountains, ambulance service would be slow, misdirected, or worse, unavailable. I could get Marla to the hospital faster myself. No, I replied to the operator, I needed the doctor to call me. Dr. Gordon was in surgery, and a Dr. Yang would call me back, she informed me calmly. Within two minutes Dr. Yang phoned. I told him a cardiac patient of Dr. Gordon’s had been badly beaten. He said to bring her to Southwest Hospital immediately.

“You’re going to have to go in,” I told Marla gently. “As soon as we get there, I’ll call Tom to tell him you’re all right and to ask him to put out an APB on Albert Lipscomb. Listen,” I blurted out, “Macguire Perkins followed you because he wants to be a cop… .” No matter what Tom said, it still sounded dumb. “Anyway, Macguire’s at Lutheran Hospital. Out at that campsite, somebody hit him, too. You, Macguire, probably Tony, too – all attacked. Marla, we must call the police as soon as we get you some medical attention.”

“Oh, Tony, Tony.” Marla groaned his name as she inched her way out of bed. Her legs were so bruised and badly cut that I bit back a cry of dismay. Without further protest, she let me help her into a large navy blue dress that buttoned up the front. I found her a pair of red sandals. She put them on, then slumped back on the bed, exhausted by the effort of dressing.

“Do you suppose Tony’s at home, but not answering? she asked. “What should we do, Goldy? I don’t know if he’d like my pressing the panic button before we can at least connect – “