Fountain of Death(28)

Frannie looked toward the wall of windows next to the picnic table and blinked. “I don’t really like this room. Those windows. I don’t really like to look out there when I don’t have to.”

“That’s right,” Nick said. “You’re the one who—ah—”

“Found the body.”

“Exactly.”

“I didn’t really find the body. I only found the foot. It was sticking out of the bushes.”

Maybe this was some kind of posttraumatic stress disorder. Nick had played a Vietnam veteran with posttraumatic stress disorder once. Frannie had moved farther into the kitchen and was staring out the window.

“Did you meet that man who was here yesterday?” she asked suddenly. “That Gregor Demarkian person, the detective?”

“Briefly.” Nick was confused.

“It said in the paper that he was good at secrets. All the cases he’s ever solved were full of secrets.”

Nick had read this article. What it had actually said was that Gregor Demarkian was good at uncovering guilty secrets.

“I don’t think the police brought him in here because he was good at secrets,” Nick told her. “I think they were taking a lot of heat about not solving the case and not really doing anything to get themselves anywhere and Demarkian was a good bone to throw at public opinion. He’s got a reputation.”

Frannie walked all the way over to the picnic table, leaned against it, and looked out the windows.

“He drove me in from the bus stop, you know. Tim did. The night he was killed.”

“I didn’t realize that.”

“He was a very nice boy. Man. Whatever. He seemed very young.”

“Everybody says that about him, yeah. That he was sort of innocent.”

“I think he had a secret,” Frannie said. “That’s why people get killed, isn’t it? Grown-up people, anyway. Children get killed just for being children.”

What was this about? It was like being in a room with a hypnotized person. No. It was worse. Nick wanted to go to the table to get his food, but all of a sudden he didn’t want to get that close to Frannie Jay. His erection was a distant memory.

“I don’t think you ought to worry too much about Tim Bradbury,” he told Frannie. He isn’t your responsibility. You didn’t even know him.”

“That’s true.”

“The police are supposed to worry about him. And Demarkian.”

Frannie Jay swayed a little, and blinked.

“Oh,” she said, in a much more normal voice. “I have to get out of here. I just came down for some—”

“Mineral water,” Nick finished. He whirled around and opened the refrigerator door again. There were dozens of fat-bellied green bottles of Perrier on the bottom shelf. He took out two.

“Here you are,” he said. “Perrier. Specialty of the house.”

Frannie Jay looked at him as if he had gone crazy. Then she came back across the kitchen and took the bottles of Perrier out of his hands.

“Thanks,” she said.

“You’re welcome,” he told her.

The bottles had the kind of caps you had to pry open with a can opener. Maybe Frannie kept an opener in her room for just that purpose.

“Well,” she said. “I guess I’d better go. It was nice talking to you.”

“It was nice talking to you, too.”

“I have three more step classes this afternoon. I’m going to be a wet noodle by the time I’m done.”

“I’ve got three more classes, too. I don’t worry about watching my calories while I’m working at this place.”

Frannie gave the last bit a smile as lame as the comment itself, said “Bye,” and went out the kitchen door. Nick Bannerman leaned back against the refrigerator doors and closed his eyes.

Now that Frannie Jay wasn’t acting crazy anymore, his erection was back. It was big and hard and solid, and any minute now he was certain it was going to hurt.





2


DESSA CARTER KNEW SOMETHING was wrong as soon as Mrs. O’Reilly picked up the phone in Derby. She could hear the sound of heavy thudding against wood and Mrs. O’Reilly’s labored breathing. In spite of her heaviness, Mrs. O’Reilly was almost never short of breath. She was a rock of a woman, as she put it herself. Rocks did not have physical limitations. As soon as she heard the thudding, Dessa Carter stiffened. She had actually been feeling pretty good before that. It was step aerobics day on the smorgasbord. Dessa was surprised to find that she liked step aerobics. She was tired and achy and hot. She felt heavier than she really was. Yet she still felt better than she had a couple of days ago. There was something to this exercise stuff. It made her mentally light.