“She says if she’d been anywhere near them girls on the top of that cliff yesterday, she woulda been the one what fell.”
“Did she tell you what prompted her to think her fellow reps are trying to kill her?”
“She says they was lookin’ at her funny.”
“How does that signal murderous intent?”
“She explained it to us real good, dear, but I can’t recall what she said now. We was all on the edge of our seats though. She really got our hearts poundin’.”
Alarm bells went off in my head. “No good is going to come of this, Nana. Trust me. I can feel it in my bones.”
“Maybe what you’re feelin’ is a touch of rheumatism, dear. The rain can bring it on real bad.”
“How do you propose to guard a six-foot transsexual?”
She regarded me over the tops of her wirerims. “We was plannin’ on wingin’ it.”
I rolled my eyes. “So in a concerted attempt to keep Jackie safe, you all voted to skip the port walk and miss exploring one of the oldest towns in Normandy?”
“We’re stayin’ on the boat on account of it’s rainin.’ Folks don’t wanna risk ruinin’ their orthotic inserts, ’cuz once you get ’em wet, they’re not worth beans no more, and Medicare don’t pay for no more than one set a year.”
“Oh.” Viewed in that light, they’d actually made a very calculated, reasonable choice. Wow. What was up with that? “So have you given any thought as to how you’re going to entertain yourselves if you stay aboard ship all day?”
“There’s a whiteboard in the lobby what lists all the onboard activities what’s happenin’ in the lounge all day long, dear. Food tastin’. Lectures. Demonstrations. Art lessons. And a couple of time slots sayin’ ‘surprise session.’ George says it sounds a lot like boot camp, only without the guns or latrine duty.” She peeked at her watch. “I hate to cut this short, dear, but Tilly’s savin’ a seat for me in the front row, so I gotta run.” She hopped off the bed.
I held up a finger to detain her. “Two things before you go. I was going to ask you to make a special effort to keep Osmond’s spirits up, but if he was feeling engaged enough to conduct a vote this morning, he must be feeling more like his old self, right?”
“Osmond didn’t conduct no vote, dear. It was Osmond what abstained. He’s so twitchy right now, he got a notion to give up his official duties until he’s not feelin’ so ‘mentally distracted’.”
“So who did the honors?”
“The Dicks. One of ’em called for the vote while the other one done the tally.” She gave her head a woeful shake. “Them two’s gonna make a real sham of the democratic process. The one don’t know how to state the proposition and the other don’t know how to add. It took ’em five rounds to get the tally right on account of Bernice decided to tweet her vote, so the final count never jived. She never would of pulled no stunt like that with Osmond ’cuz he woulda disqualified her for votin’ irregularities. He don’t tolerate no funny business with the electoral process. So’s all I’m gonna say is, if the Dicks have to fill in for Osmond for more than a day or two, it’ll be the end of the group as we know it. Them Dicks don’t got a half a brain between ’em.” She regarded me with pleading eyes. “You got any idea how much longer Osmond’s gonna be mentally distracted?”
I offered her a reassuring smile. “Not much longer, I hope. Which brings me to my second point. What’s the scoop with Margi? Osmond suggested that her winning streak at the casino was more curse than blessing. He said you’d clue me in.”