Resort to Murder Read online

  I walked slowly down the steps. I had a choice at the bottom. One walkway led west to the main house past a wall covered with bougainvillea. A second walkway led south to the upper terrace. I took the south walk. The terrace was a broad grassy expanse between the hotel and another rock wall that marked a drop-off. I looked over the wall at the swimming pool on the lower terrace. No one was in the water. Despite the gray skies and freshening wind, two leathery-skinned middle-aged women in swimsuits rested on deck chairs, one knitting, the other immersed in a book. I welcomed the warmth of a cashmere cardigan and wool slacks. No doubt they were Canadians.

  Jennings said he came to the main terrace, then looked toward the garden. It was there that he broke off, refused to say more.

  The garden sloped to the east, beds of flowers and shrubs running downhill, then up. The poinsettias blazed a vivid coral and blue petunias wavered in the wind. My gaze rose to the tower that stood at the crest of the ridge, overlooking the garden. Despite the sweep of flowers and shrubs, the eye was drawn immediately to the thirty-foot-tall, shining white tower. The parapet at the top was crenellated, so the tower had the appearance of a battlement on an English castle.

  I walked through the garden, down and up the hillsides, past orange blossoms of an African tulip tree, poinsettias and lacy green ferns, always keeping the tower in view. I paused to rest midway up the far slope. Moist air pressed against me. Rain could not be far distant. I started on, picking up my pace. The wind was brisk when I reached the base of the tower. I circled, looking for an entrance.

  I don’t know whether there was a sound or whether I simply sensed movement above me. I looked up and jerked back as a white shape fell toward me. A round face poked over the side of the parapet, then quickly disappeared. I looked down. A big bed pillow in a smudged white case lay on the flagstones. I left it there and moved on. The door to the tower, on the far side, was ajar. I pulled it wider, stepped onto a stone floor. Uneven circular steps curled upward.

  I didn’t relish climbing the steep stairs. There was utter silence above. I wished for a flashlight, but there was a patch of lighter gray far above where daylight streamed into the tower from the openings to the platform. I started up. I made no effort to be quiet. “Hello!” I called out.

  I was midway to the top when a young voice responded warily, “Hello.”

  I was out of breath when I reached the platform. The wind made an eerie sound in the rafters, rustled the shrubbery far below, stirred Jasmine Bailey’s short blond curls as she leaned against the parapet.

  She cut her eyes toward me when I stepped out onto the platform.

  I doubted it would get us very far for me to admonish her about the pillow or question whether her mother would want her to be in the tower dropping pillows or suggest she was rather a distance from the hotel. Instead, after catching my breath, I said quizzically, “An experiment?”

  Her round face creased in a pleased smile. “Oh, yes. That’s where Mr. Worrell landed, you know.”

  “I didn’t know.” I came up beside her, looked over the edge of the stone wall at the pillow far below. Mr. Worrell. Steve Jennings had insisted he couldn’t mention what he had seen in the garden to Mrs. Worrell. “Down there?”

  Jasmine wriggled with eagerness. “Right there. And now he’s a ghost. George says he came last night. At least, George thinks it was him because there was something white and Mr. Worrell always wore white.”

  “Really.” I kept my tone casual, but I was surprised. It seemed apparent that the young waiter was quite willing to provide information to hotel guests, even young ones. “Did you know Mr. Worrell?”

  Jasmine said importantly, “He sang songs in the bar. He was married to Mrs. Worrell, but she’s the one who takes care of the hotel. And he fell out of the tower and killed himself.”

  I doubted that Mrs. Worrell would be pleased to hear that an employee had been telling a very young guest that her dead husband appeared as a ghost at the tower. And now I understood Steve Jennings’s reluctance to discuss disturbances in the garden with Mrs. Worrell. And I was afraid I now knew why Diana planned the picture session out on the point.

  Jasmine peered over the edge at the pillow. “George says ghosts come back to the place where they died if they have unfinished business.” She glanced at me, her eyes bright with inquiry. “Why do you suppose Mr. Worrell’s come back?”

  “I don’t know.” The first fine drops of rain spattered on us. “Maybe we’d better go down and get the pillow. You don’t want to sleep on a wet pillow tonight”

  She giggled. “I’d just trade with Marlow. Wouldn’t that surprise her!” The little girl whirled and plunged for the steps. I hoped she’d hold on to the railing, but the hurried scuff of her sneakers indicated a rapid descent.

  I followed more slowly, chilled not by the wet wind on the parapet but by the child’s casual announcement: “That’s where Mr. Worrell landed, you know.”

  Jasmine stood in the doorway, clutching the pillow, looking out at the steady sweep of rain. I hoped the moped riders were safe and dry and would seek shelter until the rain passed.

  Jasmine plopped the pillow on the bottom step of the staircase. “Would you like to sit down?”

  The pillow was long and oversized and must have been a challenge for her to wrestle all the way to the tower. I grinned. “Thanks.” I patted the pillow beside me. “We can share.”

  She plopped down beside me, regarded me curiously. “You know,” she confided, “you don’t look like a skeleton.”

  I’d lost some weight from the pneumonia and was a bit bonier than usual. I knew I seemed very old to Jasmine, my dark hair streaked with silver and my eyes deep-socketed in a lined face. But I had an inkling she’d overheard someone else’s comment. “The skeleton at the feast,” I murmured.

  “That’s what Mom said.” She peered at me.

  So Connor had indeed taken note of the presence of her husband-to-be’s former mother-in-law. That was surely more normal than her apparently casual acceptance. I smiled and said easily, “Oh, that’s just an expression, Jasmine.” But, of course, it was Death who was the unseen companion at merry feasts. “Now tell me about your experiment. Did Mr. Worrell die a long time ago?”

  “Oh, no.” She hunched forward eagerly. “It was last year. We were here. Mr. Worrell fell out of the tower late one night.” Her face screwed up in disgust. “I didn’t hear a thing! I was asleep. Aaron said he’d had too much to drink. Anyway, Mr. Worrell fell over the edge. They said it was an accident. The police came and everything. All of the guests went over to the Southampton Princess the day of the funeral, so Mrs. Worrell could have everybody here. Have you ever been to that hotel? It’s huge. There were Gombey dancers and it was so loud I thought my ears were going to burst. We left two days later.”

  “Did you like Mr. Worrell?” I looked at her curiously. Her report had all been delivered in the same tone, Mr. Worrell’s fall given the same emphasis as the loud Gombey dancers.

  The excitement fled. “I did like him.” She spoke assertively and I gathered there were those who had not. “He was nice to the kids and he had a big laugh. Not like Mrs. Worrell. She frowns all the time. I don’t think she likes kids. And she always seemed mad at him. She was always frowning”—Jasmine turned her lips down into a scowl—“when he talked to my mom. Of course,” and she spoke proudly, “he was in love with my mother. Everybody always is.”

  I doubted Jasmine was quite yet into an adolescent girl’s preoccupation with sex. There was no hint of adult understanding in her pronouncement. I guessed she’d heard someone else comment on her mother’s attractiveness. Steve Jennings?

  The rain pattered softly. I pictured the water sluicing down the steep-stepped roofs to swirl down pipes to the catchment, lifeblood for a remote island without springs or streams. “I’m sure everyone finds your mother very charming.”

  She cocked her head at me. “Uncle Steve doesn’t like Lloyd.” She scuffed her toe on the stone floor, her
face suddenly forlorn. “Marlow doesn’t either. But Lloyd’s really nice. He plays Monopoly with me.” Her eyes were suddenly shrewd. “I think he lets me win. Of course, he isn’t funny like Mr. Worrell—”

  No, serious, striving Lloyd was not the least bit funny.

  “—but Mr. Worrell could be kind of mean. I heard him tell his wife she was about as much fun as a wooden leg. She turned away and I think she was trying not to cry.” Her face crinkled into puzzlement. “But when he died, she cried and cried.” Jasmine stared out at the curtain of rain.

  “And George says he’s come back?”

  Jasmine twisted to look up the curving stairway. “Yes. Maybe if I stay up real late I can see him.”

  I almost told Jasmine ghosts didn’t exist. But she wouldn’t have believed me. No, I didn’t believe in ghosts, but that was unimportant. What mattered was the effort being made to create the ghost of Mr. Worrell. Who was doing it, and why? I had no idea. I only knew that something dark and ugly and devious was near at hand. Moreover, my granddaughter had involved herself and was apparently trying to exploit the unhappy history of the tower.

  Oh, Diana. It was time we talked.

  four

  I CARRIED a beach towel up the steps from the pool area to the upper terrace and dried a rain-wet wooden chair. Water still gurgled softly down drain spouts, but the rain had ended, one of Bermuda’s quick, gentle showers. The sun felt warm. It might be winter in Bermuda, too cool for the chirp of the tree frogs and the blooms paltry compared to those of spring and summer, but it was definitely summery compared to the weather in my small-town Missouri home in January. My spirits lightened as the pale yellow walls of the hotel glowed from sunlight. I settled in the chair, listening to the splashes in the swimming pool on the lower terrace. From here, I would also be able to hear the mopeds curling uphill to the parking area near the entrance to the hotel.

  I pulled a paperback from my pocket. I’d found an old copy of Around the World in Eighty Days in the book cabinet in the hotel drawing room. I was midway through. I began to read, but closed the book in a few minutes. The charm of the familiar story was lost on me today.

  A motor chugged. I rose, dropped the book into my pocket and strolled toward the curve in the wall that overlooked the drive. As I looked down, Lloyd and Connor stepped out of an elegant old-fashioned, London-style cab. Lloyd reached into the backseat and lifted out four cardboard cylinders.

  Connor smiled and held out her arms. “I’ll take them up.”

  “Are you sure?” He was eager to help, his good humor obviously restored by a sojourn alone with Connor. I hoped Curt Patterson wasn’t anywhere near.

  “Yes. I’ll rest a bit, then meet you for tea.” She gave him a swift, sweet smile.

  Lloyd looked after her as she moved gracefully up the main stairs, his square face softened by love.

  I backed away from the wall, returned to my chair, thinking idly that Steve had apparently stayed in Hamilton, that the kids weren’t back yet, that Lloyd and Connor had likely bought prints of Bermuda scenes to take home as keepsakes of their wedding journey, and most of all, that Lloyd was very much in love.

  I sank into a reverie, my mind a collage of memories: Emily’s wedding day; my first glimpse of Diana as a tiny, wispy-haired baby; Richard and I one perfect October day in Mexico City; Neal running into his grandfather’s arms. The common thread was faces full of love. I was far away in time and place.

  “Henrie.” Lloyd’s voice was cheerful.

  I jolted to the reality of place.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.” Lloyd dropped into the chair beside me. “Are you enjoying the trip?” His glance was hopeful but tentative.

  This was likely the first time in more than a decade that we’d been alone together. It had taken some courage for him to approach me. Also, of course, Lloyd was one of those persons who always want to be around people. Perhaps an ex-mother-in-law was preferable to solitude. “Absolutely.” I spoke warmly. “I’m so glad I was able to come. It was very kind of you to invite me to accompany the children.”

  “My pleasure.” His tone was expansive. And pleased.

  “It’s truly lovely here.” I spread my hand to encompass the hotel and the terrace and the garden. “I hadn’t realized this was where you and Connor met.”

  Once again, happiness transformed his face. The slight puffiness under his eyes, the heaviness of his jowls, all the telltale traces of middle age disappeared in the eagerness of his gaze, the joyous curve of his lips. “Right there.” He pointed to the moongate and the steps leading down to the lower terrace. “That’s where I saw her.”

  “Was it love at first sight?” My tone was gently gibing.

  Serious, intense Lloyd simply nodded. “Yes. Yes, it was. That’s the way it should be, you know. One day you walk along and suddenly you see someone and you know nothing will ever be the same, that the future’s going to be different and wonderful. It happened for us.” His light green eyes glowed. “And the neat thing is, the same thing happened for Marlow and Aaron on Elbow Beach the year before. They just happened to be on the beach at the same time. Both of them came here for spring break and they’d never met on the campus even though they both were in school at Emory. It’s fate, you see.”

  I was long past belief in fate or karma, but I was glad Lloyd had a romantic illusion that pleased him. He was so open, his love there for everyone to see. There are none so vulnerable as those who love. I reached out, patted his hand.

  He turned his fingers, held mine. “That’s nice of you. You’re a very nice person. To wish me well.”

  I was not at all sure how nice I was. But I was too old to be critical. One of the surprising by-products of age is empathy for everyone—the right, the wrong, the good, the bad, the best, the worst, the kind, the cruel, never approving evil or ugliness or selfishness but recognizing the corrosive cost to those in the grip of darkness. “I hope everyone will wish you and Connor happiness.”

  His grasp slackened. He lifted his hand, brushed his fingers against his face as if smoothing away a cobweb. “Yeah.”

  The single word told me that serious, intense Lloyd was well aware of the unhappiness swirling around them.

  I saw no point in talking about the resistance Lloyd and Connor faced and I doubted he wanted to discuss that with me. I said briskly, “What prompted you to come to Bermuda last year?”

  “Golf.” Happily, he described his foursome and some of their previous journeys. “One of the guys had stayed here before. The hotel has privileges at some of the best courses. Even the Mid Ocean Golf Course.” There was awe in his voice. “Actually, I’d wanted to stay at the Southampton Princess. That’s a great course, too. But thank God, we didn’t. The very first night we got here I saw Connor. By the third night, I knew I wasn’t going to let her get away from me.” He spoke in a possessive-caveman tone, but it was more endearing than overbearing.

  “That must have posed a logistics problem.” My tone was light.

  Lloyd never met a joke he recognized. “I flew to Atlanta every weekend. It’s a direct flight from Dallas.”

  I’d not given any thought to the aftermath of Lloyd and Connor’s marriage. Lloyd was a partner in a small law firm in Dallas, his specialty corporate mergers. Connor and her daughters lived in Buckhead, a posh Atlanta suburb. I’d known she was a widow. Since my talk with Steve Jennings, I realized R. T. Bailey must have been very successful. I didn’t know what kind of company he had owned. It wasn’t, as a matter of fact, any of my business.

  “Will Connor and the children move to Dallas?” It was a casual question.

  For an instant, the brightness left Lloyd’s face and he looked more than middle-aged. He looked lost. He cleared his throat. “Connor’s lived in Atlanta all her life. Jasmine’s in school and Connor doesn’t want to upset her. And Marlow said they couldn’t ever move from their house.”

  Instead, Lloyd could close down his law practice and lose his golf foursome. Wha
t price love?

  Lloyd said loudly, a man reassuring himself, “I’ll have plenty to do. Connor says there’s lots to look after with her properties and the business. Steve’s been handling all of that, but I can give her advice. And I’ll be looking around. There will be opportunities.”

  Opportunities. That sounded to me like the old corporate line: “Mr. Who’s-it has left to pursue other opportunities.” Sure.

  I smiled reassuringly. “Everything will work out.” Yes, it was inane, but bromides paper over moments that would otherwise be too uncomfortable.

  Lloyd’s glance was grateful. Then he scowled.

  I looked at him in surprise but his eyes, sharp now, gazed past me. I turned and glimpsed the young waiter, George, carrying a heavy silver tray covered with a damask cloth.

  “I don’t want to cause trouble”—Lloyd’s voice was tight with anger—“but Jasmine told me something that George said to her. And if Connor hears about it…” Lloyd shook his head. “I’d talk to Mrs. Worrell, but it’s a damned awkward situation.”

  “Mrs. Worrell appears rather tense. Do you know what’s troubling her?” This morning the manager had looked up the main steps and given Connor a look of utter loathing.

  Lloyd gazed carefully about. “You never know when Mrs. Worrell’s going to pop around a corner. Nice woman, but like having a death’s-head at a party. Damn awkward.”

  Death’s-head. I felt a moment’s chill. When Jasmine chattered about the skeleton at the feast, I’d been amused. There was nothing amusing about Lloyd’s observation.

  He leaned closer to me, dropped his voice. “Of course you wouldn’t know anything about it. There was a very unfortunate accident here last year. It was awful for Connor because the fellow’d been a bit too friendly. I was about ready to put him in his place, but I was glad later that I hadn’t said anything. Poor devil got drunk and fell out of the tower. Or jumped. Mrs. Worrell’s husband. A blowhard.”