Cheating at Solitaire(117)

Marcey relaxed. She was a bigger star than Arrow was, but business was business. Arrow coming out of jail was a money shot if there ever was one. She took a long, deep sip of tea. There was so much honey in it, it coated her throat, which actually felt good. The kitchen door opened and she heard Stewart booming on about something. The other man, the one who was Gregor Demarkian, had a softer voice. Marcey wondered, not for the first time, why the people who had built this house had put the front door where nobody would ever use it.

Dr. Falmer came into the alcove where the computer was. “Why don’t you come out and sit with us in the living room,” she said. “I’ve got more tea, if you’re about to be out, and I’ve got cookies. Mr. Demarkian is just settling in.”

Marcey looked at the screen full of pictures again. If Dr. Falmer had noticed them, she hadn’t said anything. Marcey wondered if she would have. She said “just a minute” to Dr. Falmer’s retreating back, deleted the Web page, and then put the computer on to CNN. It was one of those computers that stayed on almost all the time, or stayed on the Net almost all the time. Marcey wasn’t sure how that worked. Back in Los Angeles, she had a tech person to do that kind of thing for her.



She got up and went down the little hall to the living room. She felt odd in the clothes she was wearing. They were warm, which was good, but they hung on her, and they covered her completely. She felt as if she were in hiding, which she possibly was. She’d forgotten the tea. She went back and got it. Then she edged into the living room and looked around.

“Splendid,” Stewart Gordon said. “Why don’t you sit down in the club chair, Marcey. You can balance your teacup on the arm.”

“Do you need more?” Dr. Falmer said.

“This is Gregor Demarkian,” Stewart Gordon said. “Gregor, this is Marcey Mandret.”

Gregor Demarkian held out his hand. Marcey took it. Gregor Demarkian did not seem particularly scary close up. Stewart Gordon seemed scarier. Marcey took a long sip of her tea, so long she felt as if she were going to drown in it. Dr. Falmer saw her and took the cup away to refill it.

“The one thing I want you to understand,” Gregor Demarkian said, “is that, at this point, I do not think you are a suspect in the murder of Mark Anderman, or in the murder of Kendra Rhode.”

“Was she murdered?” Marcey asked. “She was at the bottom of the stairs. I thought she must have fallen, or been pushed, and it made sense to think she’d been murdered, but I didn’t really know. I don’t really know. You shouldn’t rely on what I said, at the time, you know, because I was—”

“Right royally pissed,” Stewart Gordon said helpfully.

“Oh,” Marcey said. “No. I mean, I wasn’t pissed at all, I was just still sort of high, you know, and things were fuzzy—”

“He meant high,” Gregor Demarkian said. “It’s a Britishism. Although it’s usually used to mean drunk, and as I understand it you’d had rather more than alcohol yesterday.”

“Yes,” Marcey said. “Rather more.”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Stewart said. “You were high as a kite. I saw you. We all saw you. He’s not a reporter. Make some sense.”

“I’d had some Valium,” Marcey said. “And, um, maybe some Prozac. And things. Pills I had around the house. I was nervous.”

“Because of the murder of Mark Anderman?” Gregor asked.

“Sort of,” Marcey said. “I was mostly nervous about Arrow. I didn’t know Mark all that well. He was just one of those people, you know. He was around. He was on the set but not important. Or sometimes they were not on the set, they were local. And around and cute. And it’s boring out here. There’s no place to go but the Oscartown Inn or that bar, Cuddy’s, the one with the dark windows. There’s no music. Or. You know. Anything.”

“Okay,” Gregor said. “I want to talk about the afternoon that Mark Anderman died. And I’ll repeat, you’re not a suspect. It’s marginally possible that if Kendra Rhode was murdered, you could have committed the crime, but it is not possible in any way that you could have murdered Mark Anderman. At the time he was killed, you were in full view of a few dozen people in Cuddy’s, or on your way to this house with Stewart Gordon, or here, pretty much passed out. So it would be helpful if we could talk about that night, and about what led up to that night, without beating around the bush. Do you think we can do that?”

“I can try,” Marcey said. She thought Gregor Demarkian was a lot like Stewart Gordon, and not just because he was also very tall and deep-voiced. There was something about both of them that just made her want to do what they told her.