Death of an Orchid Lover (26 page)

I went into my bedroom, set the clock for six-fifteen. That would give me time to get cleaned up and get Gina the hell out of there before Sharon showed up. I reclaimed an old blanket I’d been planning on giving to the Boys and Girls Club, and went to bed.

T
HE ALARM CLOCK WENT OFF.
I
REACHED OUT AND
smashed down on the button. The clock went off again.

“I leapt out of bed. Aha,” I said. The ringing wasn’t the alarm. It was the doorbell. But, if the alarm hadn’t gone off yet, it had to be before six-fifteen in the morning. Who was ringing my doorbell so early?

And why was it so light out so early? I looked for my pants. Couldn’t find them. “I pulled on my Jockeys and stumbled into the hallway, yelling, I’m coming.” But when I got to the living room, the front door was already open. There were two people there.

The one outside the door was Sharon. She had on a T-shirt and jeans. She carried a brown paper bag.

The one inside was Gina. She had on a T-shirt as well. No jeans.

“I saw Sharon take in Gina’s bare legs, then stare at her face. Nice seeing you again,” she said.

Then she looked across the room at me. “I think I’ll forgo the greenhouse tour,” she said, and turned and disappeared from sight.

“Wait,” I yelled. I ran across the living room and out the door. The paper bag was on my lawn. A couple of bagels had spilled out. An egg and a pumpernickel. Sharon was already at her car, with the door open.

“It’s not what it looks like,” I said.

She got in and slammed the door. I made it to the car before she pulled away. “It’s not what it looks like.”

“A cliché like that’s bad enough once. Don’t insult me by repeating it.”

“She slept on the couch.”

“Do I look like an imbecile?”

“It’s true.”

“I was all upset because I was late and all it did was give you more time to be screwing your so-called friend.” She shook her head. “I can’t deal with this.” She sped away from the curb.

Old lady Thompson across the street was watching me intently. Only when I saw her did I realize the state of my attire. I ran inside. Gina hadn’t moved. “Why’d you have to open the door?” I said.

“It wasn’t exactly a conscious decision. The doorbell rang, I got up, I answered it.”

I said something like, “Argh,” and stomped off to my bedroom. I sat on the edge of the bed. I looked at the clock. It was blinking 12:00. Another goddamned power failure. I picked up my watch. Just past seven-thirty.

I tried to figure out how to convince Sharon that Gina’s lack of pants was perfectly innocent. Somewhat hypocritical, given where I’d been headed with the back rub the night before.

Gina came in. She’d put her jeans on. She sat beside me on the bed and put an arm around me. “Sorry,” she said.

I reached up and patted the hand on my shoulder. “Not
your fault.” I looked at the clock. Got to get going. “Got a commercial to shoot.” I went into the bathroom, stripped off my underwear, turned on the shower, got in.

I brooded while I washed my hair and soaped up. At some point I realized I wasn’t alone in the bathroom. I could see Gina’s blurred outline through the translucent shower curtain. “You could blow off the commercial and go after her,” she said.

“You don’t really think I’m that irresponsible.”

“No.”

I stewed for a few seconds more. Screw her. “If she’s not going to believe me, what do I want to be with her for anyway?”

“That’s the spirit.”

I began rinsing off. “Why waste my energy on her?” Even as I was saying these things, I knew I was deluding myself.

“No reason I can think of,” Gina said.

I finished my shower, stuck my head out. “I’m ready to get out.”

“So? Oh, sorry.” She walked into the hallway, closing the door partway behind her. I stepped out of the shower and began drying off. “Can we talk about the Albert and Laura business?” she said.

“Sure.”

“Because I had a thought. Didn’t Sam tell you that Albert was into conservation?”

“Uh-huh.”

“And you told me Yoichi acted kind of flaky when you started mentioning habitat destruction and that kind of stuff.”

“So you’re thinking—”

“Maybe Yoichi’s into something not quite kosher. Maybe
some of his plants came from somewhere they shouldn’t have.”

“He has an alibi.”

“Oh, right. Some orchid club’s Saturday night extravaganza.”

“But, still, why don’t you give Sam a call? See if Albert ever mentioned anything about Yoichi to him.” I gave her the number.

I finished drying, wrapped the towel around my waist, lathered up my face. Muffled conversation came from the bedroom. Sharon kept swimming into my mind. I kept pushing her back.

From outside the bathroom, Gina said, “Are you decent?”

“Uh-huh.”

The door swung open. “Sam definitely heard Yoichi’s name from Albert. But he can’t remember in what context. I asked if it was Yoichi being pissed off about having his plant marked down. Sam couldn’t remember for sure. He said it was months ago that Albert mentioned Yoichi to him. Then I asked if it had something to do with conservation. He wasn’t sure of that, either.”

We kicked it around while I finished shaving. I went into the bedroom and put on shorts and a T-shirt. No sense wearing good clothes under a dog suit. I slipped on my watch, picked up my wallet and keys. “Okay,” I told Gina. “Here’s what I want you to do while I’m at the shoot. I want you to call Sam back.”

“And what do I say?”

“We need to find someone.”

“Who?”

I told her. She said it was a good plan. I went off to shoot my commercial.

The animal miscegenation scheme had been scotched by the higher-ups, and Diane remained a dog. Regardless of my show of bravado in the shower, I still very much wanted to patch things up with Sharon, and during one of the breaks I slipped over to a phone and tried to reach her at work. They said she wasn’t there. I was sure she’d told everyone there to blow me off.

We were done about two-thirty. I corralled Diane out in the hallway. She was still in costume, with her dog head under her arm, like a football player with her helmet on the sidelines.

“Ready for your opening tonight?” I said.

“I am, but I don’t know if the play is. The preview was a fiasco. They missed a bunch of lighting cues and the lead had a big blowout with the director during intermission.” She shook her head. Actors. “You still coming Sunday?”

“Sure am. I wouldn’t miss it for anything.”

“We went our separate ways. I wasn’t quite sure what I would do with my comps on Sunday. If I ever got Sharon to talk to me again, I could ask her. If not, there was Gina. There was always Gina.

I checked my machine, in case Elaine had another audition for me. Instead, there was a message from Alberta Burns. I called her back. Did you get anything out of Casillas?”

“We certainly are pushy, aren’t we?”

“Did you?”

“Yes. Evidently Helen Gartner has a bit of a past.”

“Oh?”

“She did a little time.”

“What for?”

“She was a con artist. Pigeon drop, dead man’s curse, that kind of thing. Almost twenty years ago, when she lived in Denver.”

“She wouldn’t admit it when I saw her yesterday.”

“You went up to her house and bothered her about this?”

“Her store, actually. You’re sure that’s what Casillas was after her about?”

“Yes. And to answer your other question, no, it wasn’t suicide.”

“You sure?”

“Will you stop asking me if I’m sure?”

“Sorry.”

“Whoever did it did a fair job of making it look that way, but it’s damned difficult, if not impossible, to fake a suicide.”

“So—”

“Enough.”

“Huh?”

“It’s enough. Don’t ask me any more questions.” “How come you answered these?”

“I’ve been asking myself the same thing. Maybe it’s because I like you. Hard to figure out why, isn’t it?” She hung up.

I phoned the tire shop. Helen answered. I didn’t want her to know I was checking if she was there. I said, “Otto?” in a fair approximation of a Teutonic voice. She said, “Sorry, no Otto here,” and I said I was sorry and hung up.

“I drove to Reseda and rounded her up and said, I know about Denver.”

She got up, closed the office door, sat back down. “I suppose it was bound to come out.”

“Tell me about it. Tell me about when you were a crook.”

“Do you really want to know all the details? I was much younger then. I thought the easy way to make a dollar was the best way.” She looked down at her hands, inspected a finger. “Detective Casillas found out about that and thought it worth questioning me when Albert was killed.”

“Did he accuse you of having something to do with Albert’s death?”

“Not in so many words.”

“And you convinced him otherwise.” “Probably not.”

“
Did
you have something to do with Albert’s death?”

“Of course not. I was with Laura.”

“Who is conveniently dead, and therefore unable to confirm that anymore.”

“You’re suggesting I killed Laura?” “Maybe.” “Why would I kill my own alibi?”