Cheating at Solitaire(118)

“All right,” Gregor Demarkian said. “You went on the trip to Las Vegas. Yes?”

“Yes,” Marcey said.

“Why did you go? Why did anybody go?”

Marcey blinked. “I don’t understand,” she said. “What do you mean by ‘why’?”

“Well,” Gregor Demarkian said, “did you go because you wanted to gamble, or because there was legal prostitution in Nevada and you wanted to access some, or—”

“No,” Marcey said. “No. For God’s sake. No, we were just bored. The trip wasn’t even planned. We just got to the end of filming in the early afternoon and we were all sitting around in Cuddy’s being bored and Kendra said we should go to Vegas, and so we did.”

“And you got there how?” Gregor Demarkian said.

“In Kendra’s plane,” Marcey said. “Kendra has her own plane. Not that she drives it herself, you know, she has a pilot, but she was keeping it at the airport in Boston, so we all went there. And we got on the plane and went to Vegas, you know.”

“And you got there when?” Gregor Demarkian said.

“At four o’clock Vegas time,” Marcey said, “but you have to work that out, because the time zones change.”

“I know. So you got there around four o’clock and you went to the Palms. Did you have reservations?”

“Kendra and Arrow made them from the plane,” Marcey said. “Arrow wanted Kendra to have the Hugh Hefner Suite, but Kendra wouldn’t take it. She said it was ‘ostentatious.’ I had to look it up. Arrow didn’t even know what it meant.”

“So you got to Vegas and went to the Palms and checked in,” Gregor said. “That would be you, and Kendra Rhode, and Mark Anderman, and Steve Becker.”

“And Jack Bullard and that man. Carl Frank,” Marcey said. “We couldn’t believe it when we saw him there. He didn’t come with us. He’s like a spy. He’s around everywhere.”

“And Jack Bullard?”

“Oh, he was one of those people,” Marcey said. “I mean, he’s a photographer, but not a real one, don’t you see? And he’s local, and he’s cute. And Kendra liked to have him around. So he was with us that night. He took the pictures, for the, for the—”

“For the weddings?” Gregor Demarkian said.

Marcey sighed. “You know about the weddings.”

“I know about the weddings,” Gregor agreed. “It wasn’t hard to figure out. There’s that picture, with the ring on Mark Anderman’s hand catching the light and spoiling the shot. Kendra Rhode got married to Mark Anderman and Arrow Normand got married to Steve Becker.”

“God, you’re good,” Marcey said. “Carl Frank came rushing in the next morning and fixed it all, and nobody’s heard a thing about it. Steve just disappeared. Mark came back with us. Well.”

“Well, what?” Gregor Demarkian said.

“Well, he didn’t fix it all,” Marcey said. “He fixed Arrow and Steve, but not Kendra and Mark, because he said Kendra had nothing to do with him. So, you know, Mark came back with us on the plane when the weekend was over.”

“And he and Kendra were still friendly?”

“Yes, of course they were,” Marcey said. “Only he was paying more attention to Arrow, because Carl Frank paid him to. It was supposed to be a, you know, a diversion. He was supposed to hang out with Arrow so that nobody would ask what had happened to Steve. People would just think Arrow had dumped him and wouldn’t worry about it.”

“Why Mark Anderman and not Jack Bullard?”

“Carl Frank doesn’t trust Jack Bullard,” Marcey said. “He’s a photographer even if he isn’t a real photographer. Jack is. You know. And as it turned out, he was right not to trust him, because Jack Bullard sold that photograph, the one everybody sees, the one you were talking about, with the ring.”

“But he could have sold a lot more photographs, isn’t that right?” Gregor said. “He must have taken other pictures.”

“He did take other pictures,” Marcey said. “He told me about them. Later. The day you came. He wanted me to tell Kendra that he had them.”

“And did you?”

“Yes,” Marcey said.

“You said, when you came to the press conference, that now that Kendra was dead there was nobody to get Arrow Normand out of jail. What did you mean by that?”

Dr. Falmer had brought the new cup of tea some time ago. Marcey had noticed it but not paid attention to it. Now she picked up the cup and took a long drink, so long her throat felt as if it were melting. This was the part she was worried about. She was worried about it because she was sure she should have done something with the information days ago, and she was just as worried about it because she wasn’t sure what the information was. She put the cup back on the arm of the chair and took a deep breath.