pet in the closet? Rhonda s funeral must be making the
hotel staff crazier than usual.
Helen couldn t face Craig on an empty stomach. She
was ashamed of her hot flare of lust. She went down
stairs to the lobby vending machines and bought a bag
of pretzels.
The sight in the lobby stopped her short.
Arlene was sitting on a pink couch with her knitting
and her video camera. The Coronado resident had dyed
her hair egg-yolk yellow. She wore an eye-burning fuch
sia pantsuit. Helen thought she looked like an angry zit.
Helen, I didn t know you worked here! Arlene
said. Her penciled-in eyebrows bounced up and down
on her forehead and she started talking faster. I told
you about my hotel lobby hobby. You know I love to
hang out in the lobbies and people-watch. I bet you see
some sights here.
Not really, Helen said. This hotel is kind of quiet.
Except for the murder.
The quiet ones are the best, Arlene said.
I m not sure there s much to watch, Helen said. Un
less you count my ex-husband, who made quite a spec
tacle crawling into a Bentley with Marcella.
Arlene was shoving her yarn and needles into a giant
straw tote.
You don t have to leave, Helen said.
Oh yes I do. Arlene gave Helen a big lipsticked
Murder with Reservations ] 169
smile. It s nearly two o clock. I need to go home and
take my afternoon nap. We old gals have to keep to our
schedules. See you out by the Coronado pool tonight.
She was gone, just like that. Helen envied the big
woman s grace as she rose and ran lightly to her car. She
waited until Arlene pulled out of the parking lot before
she went over to the front desk. Sondra wore somber
gray today. Helen appreciated this mark of respect for
Rhonda.
What was that woman doing in the lobby? Helen
asked.
Nothing much, Sondra said. Typical tourist. She
watched people for a while, but she never talked to any
one. She knitted something pink and fluffy.Then she got
out her video camera and took pictures of everything,
the way tourists do. Shot the palm trees and the flowers,
the lobby and the pool, the pay phones and the vending
machines. You think they don t have vending machines
back home?
Who knows? Helen said.
But she knew this: Arlene lived in 2C at the Coro
nado, and that set Helen s alarm bells ringing.Too many
crooks had stayed in that apartment. She also knew Ar
lene was in a hurry to leave once when she saw Helen.
Did she really rush home for a nap? And was she really
surprised to see Helen? She couldn t remember if she d
told Arlene the name of this hotel.
There was one more question Helen couldn t an
swer: Why was Arlene at the Full Moon hotel the day of
Rhonda s funeral?
$)"15&3
ESUS SAVES was painted on the cracked plate-glass
window of the derelict drugstore.
J Does he have any bargains on Maalox? Helen
whispered to Denise.
The head housekeeper glared at her.
Helen opened the door to the storefront church and
was hit by a refrigerated blast of rubbing alcohol, adhe
sive tape and mint.
A church in a drugstore is taking the opium of the
people too far, Helen said.
You re going to hell, Denise said, sounding like Sis
ter Mary Justine. Now shut up or I ll make you walk
home. She settled her ample body on a dented folding
chair. Helen prayed it wouldn t collapse.
Helen knew why she was cracking bad jokes. She
hated this grim church. She stared at the broken tile
floor, gray with dust and blotched with old gum, and
remembered her grandmother saying, We were never
so poor we couldn t afford soap. Someone could have
mopped the floor, considering what Rhonda did for a
living. No cleaning woman should have a funeral in a
dirty church.
The altar was a barren table with a Bible and a black
cross. Rhonda s cheap gray casket seemed to suck the
Murder with Reservations ] 171
light from the room. The wilted gladioli looked like
they d been pulled out of a Dumpster. Like Rhonda.
Helen desperately wanted to believe that Rhonda s
funeral had simple dignity, but it was stark and sad.
There were thirty people in the church, including the
hotel staff. The black-clad mourners huddled together
like crows in a rainstorm.
Rhonda s mother, Shirley, was yellow and dry as an
old bone. Her battered black hat looked stepped on. Next
to her sat a plump woman who patted Shirley s sticklike
arms. Rhonda s mother leaned against the woman as if
she might collapse. Was she a sister, an aunt or a friend?
Helen was glad Shirley had someone to comfort her.
Helen also saw who wasn t there.There was no dream
lover. The only men were two skinny retirees and fat
Sam the biker. No, make that four. Leaning against the
back wall was Detective Mulruney, his suit as wrinkled
as his face.
The bony preacher with his frock coat could have
stepped from a nineteenth-century daguerreotype. He
offered cold comfort, reading from Job in a dead mono
tone: Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly
upward.
Helen wanted to shout, This is not a man s funeral.
Rhonda is a woman. Can t you say something about
her?
But the preacher never did. He read his hopeless
texts until Helen wept in frustration. No one had no
ticed Rhonda when she was alive. She was thrown away
in death. Now she was ignored at her own funeral.
I will find who killed her, Helen vowed. She knew it
sounded childish, but at least her tears stopped.
The funeral party followed a dusty hearse to the cem
etery, squeezed between two truck terminals in Lauder
dale. The graveyard was flat and treeless. Helen stared
into the hole prepared for Rhonda.The thin, lifeless dirt
was dotted with rocks, evoking sermons on seeds and
stony soil.
172 ] Elaine Viets
Helen looked at the desolate grave and wanted to
ask, Is that all there is? She knew the answer.
After the burial, Helen, Denise, Cheryl and Sondra
rode back to the Jesus Saves church in stunned silence.
They still had to endure what Rhonda s mother called
a cold collation stale sandwiches and soggy cookies.
A coffeepot was set up on the former pharmacy counter.
Helen poured herself a cup to warm her hands. She felt
chilled inside and out.
The Full Moon staff formed a miserable quartet.
They scattered when Sam approached, his plate piled
high with gray turkey sandwiches. Helen was left alone [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]