Alpine For You Part 12

"Because Bernice told a few people you were such a dandy escort, you were gonna take care a shippin' her cuckoos back home for her. Word got around, and everyone decided you might's well take care a their cuckoos, too. I don't s'pose there's any chance you could could jam all these packages in with Andy, is there?" jam all these packages in with Andy, is there?"

"Not unless they send him home in a UPS truck." I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping that when I opened them again, the packages would disappear and this would prove to be a bad dream. I opened one eye, then the other. Nope. Still there. "What am I supposed to do with all this stuff?"

"You might wanna think about movin' everything off your bed so's you'll have a place to sleep tonight."

I slumped into a chair. I looked at the cuckoos on my bed. I looked at the cuckoos on the floor. I wasn't a math whiz, but given the small area of the room, when we transferred what was on my bed to the floor, we'd be fresh out of floor s.p.a.ce. "Do you suppose anyone would notice if I strangled Bernice?"

"With the way things've been goin', someone might do it for you."

I moaned. "Well, I'm sorry to disappoint everyone, but they can march right back here and gather up their purchases because I can not not ship anything home for anyone." I gave my head an emphatic nod, then paused. "Or would it be better if I found out what room everyone is in and delivered their packages to them myself? Kind of a personal touch." ship anything home for anyone." I gave my head an emphatic nod, then paused. "Or would it be better if I found out what room everyone is in and delivered their packages to them myself? Kind of a personal touch."

"Are you thirsty, dear? I bought lemonade while I was out. I'll pour you some."

I hung up my raincoat and kicked off my shoes while Nana disappeared into the bathroom. When she reappeared, she handed me a gla.s.s of pink lemonade. "Awful about that poor Angowski woman. Inspector Miceli asked me if I could account for my whereabouts this mornin', so I was real glad I was with Bernice most of the time, except when she had to wait in that long line to use the potty and I had to buy film. It's a real shame people keep dyin'. Our Swiss Triangle Tour seems to be turnin' into the Bermuda Triangle Tour. Maybe Shirley was the last victim, but you know what they say. Death always comes in threes."

Cheery thought. "Did Helen Teig and d.i.c.k Ra.s.smuson have alibis?"

"I haven't heard, but I do know that Jane and the d.i.c.ks and their wives were all together most a the morning. I'm not sure what any of 'em would have against that Angowski woman though. They didn't even know her. Where's the motive?"

The only thing that popped into my head was that if Andy hadn't died, Shirley would have become his lover. Had a jealous ex ex-lover of Andy's punished her for making the attempt? Was the finger now pointing at Lucille Ra.s.smuson?

I chugged some lemonade, frowning when my chin and neck grew suddenly wet.

"Did the dentist give you Novocain?" Nana asked.

I held my hand under my chin to catch the liquid that was dribbling down my face.

"Maybe you should hold off on the lemonade 'til you get feelin' back in your lips."

I handed her the gla.s.s and ran into the bathroom to wipe my face. The phone rang. Nana answered. I looked at myself in the mirror. "YEOW!" I had racc.o.o.n eyes from crying. My lipstick was smeared across my cheeks. My foundation was streaked with iridescent brown patches that had formerly been eyeliner and shadow. I looked like something from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Rocky Horror Picture Show.

"You don't say," I heard Nana say to the person on the phone. "Is that right?"

I grabbed the soap and scrubbed my face. I felt like a criminal having to wash away the beautiful face Shirley Angowski had created for me. She'd been such an artist. A modern-day da Vinci. But where da Vinci's work had lasted for centuries, Shirley's had only lasted the morning. I guess that was the downside of working with water-based products.

"I see," said Nana. "You bet. Thank you."

I dried my face and regarded myself in the mirror again. Even though I was still sporting Angelina Jolie's lips, I looked pretty ordinary without Catherine Zeta-Jones's eyebrows and Bo Derek's cheekbones. And then a horrible thought struck me. What if Inspector Miceli had found me desirable simply because of the magic Shirley Angowski had worked on my face? What if I never again looked as good as I'd looked this morning? Would he still find me desirable?

I stared fitfully at the sink. Unh-oh. Had my big chance at romance just washed down the drain with my SPF 6 foundation?

"That was the front desk," Nana announced from the bedroom. "They found a new room for us, so we gotta move."

I shot my head out the door. "Really?" Could I put the fear of G.o.d in people or what?

"They were real nice about it, Emily. Said they'd send a bellman up right away to transfer our luggage for us. We can even ride in the freight elevator with 'im to make sure our things actually arrive."

All right. Now we were getting somewhere. "Did they happen to say they'd found my luggage?"

"Nope. You want I should call 'em back and ask?"

"They might have moved it to the new room already. I'll just wait and be surprised."

We repacked Nana's suitcase and finished as the bellman arrived. He loaded everything onto his cart then escorted us down to the second floor. To room number2248. He opened the door and switched on the light. "Well, would you look at that," said Nana.

This room was exactly like the last one, with one exception.

There was only one bed.

"What is this?" I asked.

"Your new room, Madame."

"N-no, no. Our new room is supposed to be a suite."

"This is the only room available at the moment."

I checked out the windowless walls. The carpetless floor. The narrow, solitary bed. I could feel myself start to hyperventilate. "If this isn't the suite we were promised, WHY ARE WE HERE?"

"Police orders, Madame. They've requested that the area surrounding your former room be cordoned off. The lady in the room adjacent to yours was apparently found dead atop Mount Pilatus today, so they need to conduct a full investigation."

I stood there in a semicatatonic state. If I didn't know better, I'd guess the dentist had shot Novocain into my brain rather than my mouth. I gestured toward the bed. "Does management realize there are two of us?"

"If you'd care to request separate beds, we can move you when something opens up."

They were wearing me down. I could feel my shoulders slump. My spine shrink. Maybe I was getting too old for this job. "We'll need a roll-away cot then."

"I'm sorry, Madame. All our cots are presently in service, but I'll make note of your request and see that one is delivered to you when it comes available."

"What are the chances one will come available before we leave?"

"Slim to none, Madame."

"That's what I figured."

By the time all the shopping sacks were piled on the floor, the room looked like the town dump. The only thing missing was seagulls. And the stench. Nana stood at the foot of the bed, observing it from all angles. "This won't be so bad, Emily. I'm pretty sure it's a double. See, it has two pillows."

Yeah. But they were stacked on top of each other.

Nana reached for her pocketbook and removed a small plastic bag. "You wanna see what I bought in that hotel gift shop to bring home to the boys?" 'The boys' were my brother Steve's five sons, ranging in age from two to eight. I baby-sat for them sometimes when I needed positive reinforcement that my life as a single female wasn't so bad.

"Watches," she said, lining them up on the bed. All five watches were identical--a vivid blue-and-green background with the head of a black-and-white cartoon-character cow in the foreground. "I got 'em all the same so's there wouldn't be any fightin'. Swatch. That's a good brand, isn't it?"

"It's a great brand," I said, blinded by the screaming wristbands stamped with psychedelic flowers and more cartoon characters. They looked like something that belonged in a toddler's playpen, but there was one thing that made them enviable.

They were ticking.

"The boys should love them, Nana." And they might have them a while, too, if they could refrain from feeding them to the dog.

"You wanna borrow one 'til you get your watch repaired? I don't think the boys would mind."

I regarded the Swatch with its hands keeping perfect time around the cow's little misshapen head. I eyed my gold-plated Gucci with its elegant hands stuck on 10:13. "Okay." Did I need to have my arm twisted or what?

I set my Gucci on the desk and strapped the Swatch onto my wrist. Okay, so the cow made me look like a dork, but at least I'd be a punctual dork.

Nana removed her toiletry bag from her suitcase and dug out her plastic soap container. "That fingerprint ink left an awful mess on everyone's hands. Lookit mine." She held them up for me to see. "They're still black."

I smacked the heel of my palm against my forehead. "Oh my G.o.d. I forgot to tell you about Andy. They know what killed him." I paused for dramatic effect. "Dimethyl sulfate."

"Die what?"

"Dimethyl sulfate. Poison." Poison."

"No."

"Yes. But it wasn't in his inhaler. The police don't know how it got into his system, but you have to figure it was deliberate. They're treating his death as a definite homicide. And they're doubtful Mr. Nunzio is the perpetrator because poison suggests a close emotional bond with the victim, and Andy and Nunzio had a three-minute relationship, tops."

"What kind a poison is dimethyl sulfate?"

"I guess it's the kind that if it gets into your system, you die."

Nana rolled her eyes. "Where do you get it?"

"Oh, you mean, can you buy it over the counter or do you have to special order from someplace? I suppose if we can figure out who had easy access to it, we might nab our killer before he nails victim number three." I made a pointer of my finger and aimed it at Nana. "How about we fire up your laptop and do some surfing."

She yanked her computer out of her suitcase and set it on the desk. She sat down, flipped open the lid, powered up, then poised her fingers on the keyboard and began typing. I'd taken several computer courses in college, but my expertise in the field consisted of writing and retrieving E-mail and cursing really loud when AOL disconnected me. Nana had never attended college or taken a computer course, but she could hack her way into the files of any government agency with a few clicks of her mouse. Go figure.

After some humming and buzzing, the screen filled with text. Nana scanned the information and read aloud. "Dimethyl sulfate. Also known as sulfuric acid dimethyl ester. It's a highly toxic, colorless, odorless, oily liquid. Exposure can cause sore throat, runny nose, swellin' around the mouth and lips, tearin', pink eye, cyanosis, and death. After exposure, there may be a period of up to ten hours before symptoms manifest themselves. Dimethyl sulfate is used in the manufacture of dyes, drugs, perfumes, and pesticides."

"Dyes, drugs, perfumes, and pesticides?" I repeated. "d.i.c.k Ra.s.smuson spent all those years running that pesticide business. Jane Hanson has access to all those drugs in the pharmacy. The Teigs were professional dry cleaners and dyers. And those are just the people at my table in the dining room! d.i.c.k Stolee used to work for that company that supplied chemicals to the perfume industry. If dimethyl sulfate is present in pesticides, every former grain farmer on the tour could have had easy access to it. Lars Bakke. George Farkas."

"I don't suppose they all had a hand in killin' Andy."

"The police seem to think one of them did." The question was, which one?

"Anything else you want me to check while I'm online?" Nana asked.

I looked at our room. I looked at the computer screen. I looked at Nana's nimble little fingers. A dormant synapse suddenly fired in the numbed gray matter of my brain. Duh? Why hadn't I thought of it before? If Nana could hack her way into a government agency, a Swiss hotel should be child's play. "Bring up the Grand Palais Hotel." I smiled. "There's more than one way to skin a cat."

Dinner that night consisted of roasted potatoes, peas, and a slab of meat that looked like chicken but had the consistency of squid. The places formerly occupied by Andy and Shirley Angowski were conspicuously vacant. The rest of us kept sneaking furtive looks at the empty chairs, and at each other.

"It's just like that story, Ten Little Indians," Ten Little Indians," said Helen Teig. "Every time we eat dinner, someone else is missing. Someone else has been murdered. I wonder who'll be next? It happens in threes, you know." said Helen Teig. "Every time we eat dinner, someone else is missing. Someone else has been murdered. I wonder who'll be next? It happens in threes, you know."

I really needed to hear that again.

"No one knows if that Angowski woman was murdered," insisted d.i.c.k Ra.s.smuson. "She might have fallen accidentally."

"They suspect murder," Helen countered. "Why else would the police have taken our fingerprints and asked us all those questions? They probably think Shirley was killed by the same person who killed Andy."

"Where were you when Shirley went over the cliff?" d.i.c.k Teig asked me.

"I was probably in the hotel restaurant foolishly ordering the vegetable lasagna."

"That's what I ordered at the Swiss Express," said Jane Hanson. "Mine was wonderful."

"You must have ordered the version without the metal p.r.o.ng."

"Someone said you were the last person to see Shirley alive," Helen said.

Was I? A chill raced up my spine. No, wait. That might not be true. "If Shirley was pushed to her death, her killer killer would have been the last person to see her alive. Not me." I waited, half-expecting someone to jump up and yell, "Okay! You got me! I did it!" But no one so much as twitched. What was wrong with these people? Didn't they ever watch old would have been the last person to see her alive. Not me." I waited, half-expecting someone to jump up and yell, "Okay! You got me! I did it!" But no one so much as twitched. What was wrong with these people? Didn't they ever watch old Perry Mason Perry Mason reruns? reruns?

"Was anyone with you when you saw her?" Lucille asked.

I shook my head. "I was by myself."

Cryptic looks pa.s.sed all around the table.

"What? So what if I was alone? Since when is it a crime to go exploring by yourself?"

"You don't have an alibi," Lucille said, using her na-nanana-na na-nanana-na tone again. "The rest of us have ironclad alibis. If you have no one to corroborate your whereabouts, you could be the killer." tone again. "The rest of us have ironclad alibis. If you have no one to corroborate your whereabouts, you could be the killer."

I could see them all inch back in their chairs, putting as much distance between me and them as was humanly possible. "I liked liked Shirley! Why would I kill her?" Shirley! Why would I kill her?"

"What time was it when you last saw her?" fired Helen.

"10:13.".

"That don't wash," said d.i.c.k Teig. "We didn't reach the top of the mountain 'til around 10:20."

"My watch has been stuck on 10:13 for two days now. It's broken!"

"That's pretty G.o.dd.a.m.n dumb," said d.i.c.k Ra.s.smuson. "Why are you wearing a watch that doesn't work?"

"Because I like it," I snapped back. "And the band matches my favorite color lipstick."

d.i.c.k Teig studied my wristband. "Your wristband's blue. I don't recall seein' you wear blue lipstick."

He probably didn't recall seeing his wife wear green eyebrows either. Men could be really oblivious that way. "I'm wearing a different watch tonight. This one is unique. It works." I flashed my wrist in front of them for all to see.

"Is that supposed to be a cow?" asked Jane.

"I think it's a Holstein," I said. "They're the ones that are black and white."

"That's no cow," d.i.c.k Ra.s.smuson a.s.serted. "It has horns. That makes it a bull."

"It could be a steer," said Lucille. "Steers have horns."

Helen looked pensive. "Do steers have d.i.c.ks?"