7

“I’m as old as water, and just as weak.”

The very old woman in the sunbonnet had only glanced up at Jack as he came along the shady side of the swimming pool. She was on her knees on the lawn removing the very few weeds from the azalea border. She dug into the soil with bare fingers. She had no gardening tools. At first he thought she was talking to the plants.

“Plants; weeds,” she continued muttering at the soil: “Just like children.” She pinched a dead leaf off an azalea. “Nurture some plants beautifully, give them everything they want and need, and some of them just curl up ugly. Beat some weeds to death and they just keep popping up, growing, proliferating. If we had genuine respect for character, we’d cultivate weeds and send the plants to mulch.” She sat back on her heels and looked up at where Jack stood, looking down at her. “Hello.”

“Hello, Ma’am.”

“Are you a weed, or a plant?”

Jack said, “I think I’m a weed.”

“That’s good. You look strong and resilient enough to be a weed, that you do. You’re new here. I’m Mrs. Houston.”

“Sorry, Ma’am. I don’t recognize your name.”

“Mother of Amalie Radliegh, Mrs. Radliegh. Grandmother to most of the big brats around here, great-grandmother to most of the little brats. I call the little brats, Amy’s brats, ‘The Sudden Seven.’ I looked away for a moment and there they were.”

“Maybe they’re weeds,” Jack offered.

“That would be nice. But I doubt it. Here at Vindemia she has them each bedded in rich nutrients and waters them daily, here at the pool. Weeds don’t need as much as they have.”

“Weeds can stand some good treatment, too,” Jack said.

“I’m not so sure.”

“I’ve had some,” he said. “I’m still a weed.”

“Looks like you’ve had some good nutrients, anyway.” The old lady’s blue eyes were looking at Jack as if she would know him in a minute. “What’s your name?”

“Jack.”

“Are you quick and nimble?”

“For a weed.”

“Yes. I believe you are. Now I’m not supposed to be messing up the garden this way, I know that. Do you mind?”

“Not at all.”

“But one has to do something. One can’t just sit around all day and night being waited on hand and foot. At least I can’t. One loses touch with oneself if one doesn’t do work of some kind, some time. Don’t you agree?”

“I suppose I would.”

“I don’t even want to go to heaven,” Mrs. Houston said as she dug her fingers into the soil, “unless they have some work for me to do there.”

“Is Vindemia pretty close to heaven?” Jack asked.

“All these people here dragging themselves from swimming pool to tennis court to gymnasium to the stables worrying about their figures, their skin tone, the shine of their hair. Do you know they don’t even saddle their own horses?”

“I didn’t know that.”

“And do you think they’re happy? Not a bit of it. Not one of them. You never heard such a chorus of complaining, weeping. I say to them, ‘Make your own bed, get your own breakfast, saddle your own horse, clean your own car, go start a garden of your own: you’ll feel better.’ What do they complain about? That they’re not allowed to be themselves.” Mrs. Houston raised a soil-encrusted index finger to Jack. “I suspect they don’t know who themselves are. Everything Chester asks them to do, expects them to do, they think is unfair. They think doing their duty is unfair! You know what my daughter says?”

“I’ve never met the lady.”

“She asks, ‘Why do I have to talk to the cook once a week? Why do I ever have to talk to the housekeeper? Why do I have to be at Chester’s elbow every time he entertains all those boring people?’ Can you believe that? I say, ‘Because it’s your job, daughter.’ She says, ‘But sometimes I don’t feel like being nice to people. It can be inconvenient.’ I tried to tell her that everything in life costs. Being Chester Radliegh’s wife, living here, costs. She’s got to pay the price, whatever it is, just like everybody else on this earth. She’s got to do her duty. Extending herself to people important to him is little enough to pay for all she has.”

“I’m glad to meet you, Mrs. Houston,” Jack said. “I’m expected at Doctor Radliegh’s secretary’s office in a few minutes.”

“You don’t know the cost of things until you’ve had to work for everything you’ve ever had, as I did. When my husband died from overwork and hopelessness, I worked as a hotel maid from six in the morning until three, and after that in the hotel laundry to raise Amalie, send her through secretarial school. That was my duty, and I did it. My grandchildren just think all this is natural.” Mrs. Houston’s wave of her arm took in all Vindemia. “It just fell from the sky, as free as the sunlight and rain. They complain about their father, what he expects of them. I say, ‘What if you were born in the slums? What if you were hungry every day? Would you complain as much then?’ They say, ‘It didn’t happen.’”

The clock in the peak of the pool cabana’s roof read twenty two minutes past twelve. He was due at the secretary’s office at twelve thirty and he still didn’t know where it was.

“Let me tell you,” Mrs. Houston said to Jack, or the azaleas. “Chester is a sainted man. Out of his own genius and hard work he has created all this, given them everything they could want, and how do they thank him? They never have a smile for him, a kind word, not a lick of appreciation or respect. I’d like to see one of them do ten percent of what he’s done. No, they think he’s some kind of a hard taskmaster just because he expects them to behave decently and do their duty. I tell you.”

“Doctor Radliegh must expect a lot from himself,” Jack said.

“He does indeed.”

“Maybe too much from them?”

“He expects something from them.”

“I must go,” Jack said. “I don’t want to be fired on my first day of work.”

Mrs. Houston said, “Here I am, hiding behind a hedge, digging around in a garden that doesn’t need digging. The garden doesn’t need digging, but I need the work of digging. I’ll be damned if I let myself become a petunia like the rest of them. You won’t tell on me?”

“Never,” Jack said.

“Thing is,” Mrs. Houston said to Jack, “I appreciate. I respect. I appreciate and respect Chester. I also respect myself.”

“I see that,” Jack said. “Thanks for your help.”

•

On a bicycle assigned to him the night before when his car was locked in the compound, Jack coasted down a shaded slope to a wide and deep, well landscaped building he supposed housed the business offices. He had spotted what appeared to be the top of a transmitter tower over the trees and went to find its base.

Beyond the big building was an airstrip with one big hangar next to a short control tower.

Around the big, landscaped building was a driveway wide enough for cars to park on it, neatly, without giving the appearance of a parking lot. There weren’t that many cars anyway. There were more bicycles in bike stands than there were cars.

He rode his bike to the front of the building, noticing there was no sign identifying the building. He slipped the front wheel of his bike into a stand. As all the bikes were alike, he noted that his was in the thirteenth slot from the left.

“Hey, Jack!”

One of the two men coming out of the front door of the building was the man who had hired Jack the day before.

“‘Morning, Mister Downes.”

Jack’s folded t-shirt hung out of the waistband at the back of his shorts.

“Come meet Eric Beauville, Jack. This is the man who runs the world, as far as you’re concerned. Chief Executive Officer of most things named Radliegh.”

Shaking hands with Jack, Beauville did not smile. “I don’t run the world. I follow orders like everybody else. There’s a computer list of new orders on my desk at six o’clock every morning.”

“Well.” Downes hitched up his trouser waist. “Working for Doctor Radliegh never leaves the slightest doubt as to what is expected of one.”

“At six a.m., six thirty a.m., eight a.m., eleven a.m.,” Beauville said, “two p.m., four p.m., eight p.m., eleven p.m.”

Downes laughed. “Yes. Well.”

“Saturdays and Sundays included,” Beauville concluded.

“You here to see Ms. Dunbar?” Downes asked Jack.

“I’m afraid I’m late. I—”

“No excuses accepted,” Beauville said. “When Chester built the lake over there he said henceforth all excuses were to be deep-sixed in there. He said he built it deep enough for every excuse we could think up. He didn’t want to hear them anymore.”

“You’re sweating,” Downes said. “Why don’t you walk around the back of the building, try to stay out of the air conditioning. Chester’s office is in the center. Ms. Dunbar will see you through the window.”

“She probably has your pink slip ready,” Beauville said, “to fire you, if you’re more than two minutes late.”

“I’m more than two minutes late,” Jack said.

“Then nice having met you. Okay, Downes.” Beauville headed for a gray BMW coupe. “Better go back to town after lunch and find us another whatever-he-is. Pool ornament?”

“Lunch first.” Downes followed Beauville to the car.

“Yeah.” Beauville opened the car door. “You don’t want to miss lunch with Chester. Three sliced half pears, a glob of cottage cheese and iced tea.”

Downes said, “I’ll have a cheeseburger in-town later.” He appeared to be talking to himself. “Ketchup and onions.”

•

“You’re late.”

Jack had walked halfway along the back of the building. The windows were tinted so he could not see the rooms inside.

All he could see in the windows was himself.

A sliding glass door had opened.

“Sorry,” Jack said. “Want an excuse?”

“Not really.” Nancy Dunbar, although trim enough in figure, had an unattractive face. Her forehead was low, her chin receded, her eyes were small and close together, her nose wide. Her face looked pinched at birth. “Do you have one?”

“I couldn’t find anyone to give me directions. Do you have a map?”

“Yes.” She reached inside the building. “You didn’t start in time. Don’t come in. The air conditioning will chill you. You’re sweating. Don’t bother putting on your shirt.” Outside the building, she slid the glass door shut. She had a loose piece of paper in her hand. A purse dangled from her arm. “We’ll go over there.”

She handed Jack the map. He folded it and put it in his back pocket.

He went with her along a walk toward what he thought was another building. They went through an arch in the wall.

He found himself in a walled Japanese garden. Ordinary rocks surrounded by raked sand were spaced throughout it. Stone benches were placed along the meandering natural stone walk that went around and through it. Graceful trees with few leaves stood against the walls of the garden.

“Hey,” Jack said. “This is nice.”

“Are you artistic?” Nancy sat on the stone bench closest to the wall nearest the office building. “Raking this daily will be your chore.” Quickly, she took a cigarette out of her purse and lit it. She inhaled deeply. “Try to vary the designs the rake makes in the sand, will you? If you rake it the same way every day, Doctor Radliegh will notice and mention to me that you are a bore with a rake.”

“I guess that’s better than being a rake with a bore.”

She glanced at him. She said: “Humor.”

“I’m not fired?”

“For being late?” She exhaled a large amount of smoke. “Not this time.”

“I didn’t think so,” Jack said. “You’re smoking.”

“Right,” she said. “Not permitted. Care for a cigarette?”

“No, thanks.”

She was putting the ash from her cigarette into a Ziploc bag she had taken from her purse.

“Now, then, I assume Downes gave you all the do’s and don’ts regarding working here.”

“Mostly don’ts,” Jack said.

“This garden is your chore, the outdoor pool, the indoor pool, gymnasium, saunas, whirlpool, tennis courts. You’re expected to help out the gardeners when they ask, also the indoor help, in the event of too many guests, or a party. There will be a party here Saturday night. You don’t mind putting on a white jacket and handing around canapes, do you?”

“I’ll have to sample them first,” Jack said, “so I’ll feel good about sharing them with the guests.”

“Who has talked to you here so far?”

“Mrs. Houston.”

Nancy smiled. “She’s about the only reasonable one here. She’s my good friend. What did she say to you?”

“She may have been talking to the azaleas.”

“Ah!” Nancy smiled again. “She really opened up on you.”

“Or the azaleas.”

“You can forget whatever she says.”

“Okay.”

“Her loyalty is unquestioned. Who else has spoken to you?”

“A young woman who swam in the pool this morning. And a young man joined her. He didn’t speak to me. Is she called Shana?”

“And Chet. Chester Junior. What did Shana say to you?”

“She asked if I worked here, when did I arrive, that sort of thing.”

“They are affianced.”

“Going to marry up with each other,” he said.

“Yes. Exactly that. Anyone else?”

“No. I found my quarters last night. Ate my sandwiches. Walked around. I saw no one at all, except the guard at the gate who let me in.”

“You won’t be that lonely,” she said. “Didn’t you find the staff recreation hall?”

“No.”

“Ping-Pong. Stereo. Billiards. Wide-screen t.v. Quite nice, really.”

“Oh, wow.”

“The thing is that you are not wanted around when members of the family or guests are present, unless there is a need for you. On the other hand …” She put out her cigarette against the sole of her shoe. No ashes fell to the ground. She must have practiced this maneuver. She put the filter into her little plastic baggy. Immediately, she lit another cigarette. “… if you notice anybody acting oddly, saying anything odd, you are to come and tell me.”

“You mean, if I see someone breaking the rules?”

“Yes. That, of course. But I’m speaking of members of the family and guests as well as staff.”

“Like Mrs. Houston?”

“Not Mrs. Houston. She is the exception. But that sort of thing, yes. We want to know of any plans you hear anybody make. If you see people together you think don’t belong together, we want to know. We want to know of comments you hear people make about each other, Mr. Beauville, me, Doctor Radliegh. That sort of thing.”

“Why?”

“Doctor Radliegh does not like surprises.”

“That’s the simple answer?”

“Yes.”

“What about people’s privacy?”

“Oh, all this information is private. If I think it necessary, I will pass it on to Doctor Radliegh, but it goes no farther than him.”

Jack did not say anything. Granted, odd things were going on, possibly four attempts on Radliegh’s life. He did not want Nancy Dunbar to know he had been told of them. Perhaps some such precautions were necessary.

The idea of his spying was hateful to him.

Yet that was why he was there, wasn’t it?

“Is all this clear?” Nancy asked.

“Yes.”

There was the sound of a siren.

Nancy’s eyes widened. “Oh, my God.”

Quickly, she ground the cigarette out against her shoe, dumped the bent filtered cigarette in her baggy, dropped that in her purse, snapped her purse shut, stood up and began running toward her office.

Jack walked rapidly after her.

After the sunlight in the garden, her office was cold and dark. It took him a moment to see in the room.

She stood at her desk, talking on the telephone. “Yes … Yes … And Doctor Radliegh was not there? … I see … Thank you,” she said. “I’ll take care of it.”

After she hung up, Jack said, “What?”

“Doctor Jim Wilson was overcome by some sort of gas in the laboratory. The ambulance has come for him.”

The phone rang.

“Yes?” she said into the receiver. “Yes … ? I see. I’ll take care of it.”

Slowly, she hung up.

To Jack, or to herself, she said, “Jim Wilson is dead.”

Jack said nothing.

“Odd,” Nancy Dunbar said.

“Yes,” Jack said. “What do you say is odd?”

“Doctor Radliegh always arrives first in the laboratory. He wants the time alone before Jim comes in at two o’clock.” She looked at her watch. “It’s only one-thirty. Normally, Doctor Radliegh would be there alone.”

Jack said, “That’s five.”

•

Standing on the road on one leg, his other leg draped over his bike’s boy bar, Jack watched people assemble in front of the hacienda-style laboratory across the road from Radliegh’s main offices.

Back doors open, the ambulance was parked in front of the building.

Jack assumed the ambulance attendants had entered the building to recover the body of Doctor Jim Wilson. Some of the building’s windows had been smashed, presumably to let the lethal gas escape.

Down the road at high speed rode a man on a bicycle. In his late fifties, he was tall, slim, broad-shouldered. His hair was salt and pepper gray and black. He wore horn-rimmed glasses.

Jack saw a tongue of flame spurt from a broken window on the first floor of the building.

“Hey!” Jack pointed at the window, at the flame.

The older man dropped his bike on the lawn and ran toward the building’s front door.

“Hey!” No one was paying attention to Jack.

Smoke was now rushing through that window.

The older man collided with the ambulance attendants rushing out of the building at the front door.

The older man tried to push past them.

One attendant tried to grab his arm.

“No, Doctor Radliegh!” the attendant yelled. “Fire!”

Radliegh pushed the attendant away. “Jim Wilson! Is he dead?”

The other attendant fell to his knees on the lawn, coughing.

“Smoke!” the attendant yelled. “The building’s on fire! Stay out of there!”

Radliegh disappeared into the building.

“Oh, my God, no,” a woman on the sidewalk said. She screamed: “Doctor Radliegh! No!”

The attendant who had tried to stop Radliegh seemed pushed backward from the smoke rushing out of the open door.

For a moment, except for the soft wind noise of the flames and the smoke coming through the door and some of the smashed windows, there was silence.

Then there was an enormous bang. Just the sound made the people in the road jump back and duck their heads.

Tiles from the building’s roof shot into the air.

The first story walls of the laboratory’s main section blew out. The second story walls collapsed inward from their tops as if pulled by cables.

“No!” screamed the woman.

Pieces of the roof fell into the building, sending both smoke and dust into the sky.

“Doctor Radliegh!” The weeping woman turned her back to the building. She embraced another woman. “The boss …”

Jack looked at his watch.

It was one fifty.

Smoke at one side of the building swirled like fog.

Through that smoke walked the older man.

In his arms he carried the limp body of another man.

The building’s collapse almost had put out the fire.

Still, the air was thick with smoke and dust.

Walking heavily, smoke-stained, Radliegh carried the body of Doctor Jim Wilson to the ambulance.

Quietly, the people watched him.

Gently, Radliegh placed the body as well as he could on the floor of the back of the ambulance. Bent at the knees, the corpse’s legs dangled over the road.

Radliegh turned. In a low voice, simply, he said to the people, “He is dead.”

Slowly, he picked up his bicycle. Without glancing at the destroyed laboratory, he walked the bike across the street and neatly put it in the rack.

Then he entered the office building.

To himself, Jack said, “Six?”