Healthy Place to Die (22 page)

“It’s not as cold here as I thought,” she said, “but I am glad I wore it.” She looked around carefully, making sure no one was near enough to overhear—just as she had in
Games in the Night,
when the will had just been read and a statue had fallen from above and only just missed her. “I do have a little more information for you,” she said in a hoarse whisper that had “conspirator” stamped on it.

“Might be safer to talk in a natural voice,” I said, trying not to put it in the way that director von Stroheim might have. “Less suspicious.”

We were evidently on different cinematic wavelengths, for she nodded and said with a straight face. “Yes, Mr. Capra.”

“So you’ve been sleuthing,” I prompted her.

“I didn’t have to. That Frenchman, Michel Leblanc, I know now what he and Kathleen Evans were talking about in the Roman baths and the other time, on the lawn.”

“You do? What was it?”

“Your coarse American expression is the best way to put it. He ‘came on to me.’”

“Can’t blame him for that,” I said, hoping it sounded gallant. If it did, she failed to notice. “Thinking back to those two times I saw them, I’m sure that’s what he was doing then.” She twirled her champagne glass and put on a Hollywood smile. “Don’t say anything. Here he comes now.”

Michel joined us, pointing to a toothsome array of tartlets on a glass tray. “I made those,” he said proudly. “Baked oysters.” We tasted and congratulated him.

Small triangles of pizza had broccoli
rabe,
black olives, and smoked mozzarella and were proving a popular item. Toasted cakes fresh from the oven and piled with goat cheese shavings were going like—well, like hot cakes.

I became aware of eyes on me from across the table. It was Elaine, and she was very judiciously flickering her gaze across the chamber toward the wall carved like a château front. I was just in time to see Janet disappear through the portcullis gate.

Eating and drinking stimulate my brain. Anyway, I have always gotten away with that story, and it seemed justified now. Janet’s information clarified some of the mystery, but the whereabouts of Kathleen and her probable fate were still clouded.

“Puzzling over what to eat next?”

The question broke in on my thoughts. It was Leighton Vance in a snappy sky-blue blazer with an impossibly white shirt and white pants. He looked to be in a cheerful mood, and he was with Millicent Manners, uncharacteristically bucolic in a Tyrolean-style skirt and blouse.

“It’s all so good,” I said.

“A fitting farewell,” he said with a smile. “Have you tried the spring rolls?”

“No, did you make them?”

“One of my staff did,” he said, implying that making spring rolls was beneath his culinary dignity.

I tasted one. “An interesting variation on the Oriental way of making them.”

He had already turned his attention back to Millicent Manners, and my compliment fell on deaf ears. I drifted along the table, stopping to exchange pleasantries with the Japanese lady and with Helmut Helberg, who was lamenting the end of the week having arrived so quickly. I continued to drift until I met Elaine, disengaging herself from Gunther Probst.

“That man wants to put everything on software,” she complained.

I waited until we were in a comparatively safe zone, then said, “Did you see Janet? She went into the ice château.”

“One second she was there, the next she was gone,” Elaine said. “I assumed that’s where she disappeared to. Are you going to follow her?”

“Me? Well, I suppose one of us should.”

“You’re the investigator,” she said, elegantly crooking a little finger as she picked up a rib glistening with a reddish sauce.

“Actually, I’m not,” I protested. “Like I told you, I only—”

“I know, I know,” she said impatiently, “but you’re the nearest thing to an investigator we have.”

“Very flattering. I’m not sure what I can do, though.”

“Have you tried one of these ribs? They’re delicious.” She was licking the sauce and it did look good.

“Venison, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know, but I’m having another.”

“So while you’re stuffing yourself, you want to send me into the jaws of death?”

“As a lawyer, I can’t recommend prowling around where signs specifically prohibit such an activity. On the other hand, I don’t see what else we can do. We have nothing to take to the police. One disappeared female, who for all intents and purposes has gone back to New York? They’d laugh at us—well, no, being Swiss, they’d be very polite—but where would that get us?”

“Are you sure that the best alternative is sending me in there? Well,” I said, “it doesn’t matter. If Janet is in there, I have to go in after her.”

“Stout fellow,” she said with only a touch of irony. “Only don’t say ‘I,’ say ‘we.’”

“You’re coming too? I thought you were ducking out, sending me?”

“Just wanted to see your reaction. Anyway, first, I need more sustenance.” She took another venison rib and I took one too. One of the blond staffers was nearby, pouring the very good Vesperterminen wine. Elaine and I both had refills, and I noted that the staffer’s name badge said “Olga.” “I haven’t seen Rhoda today,” I said to her. “Is she on duty?”

“She’s on a few days’ leave,” the blonde replied.

She gave me a dazzling smile and continued on her wine-dispensing mission of mercy.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” I murmured to Elaine.

She didn’t offer any solace, being too busy scanning the scene. “Everybody’s pretty well occupied right now,” she said quietly. “We’ll split up, go to the fringes of the crowd, one to the right, one to the left, then one at a time head for the château entrance.”

“Portcullis.”

“Whatever.” She was gone, and I had just time enough to empty my wineglass before I moved too.

I
’M NOT AFRAID OF
the dark—well, no more than the average person anyway. This was a different proposition, though: these Cimmerian chambers were deep inside the bowels of a glacier that was not only millions of years old but sliding downhill at the rate of several inches a year. I kept reminding myself that this was Switzerland, and the Swiss are too realistic, too practical, too efficient to permit dangerous places like sliding glaciers. Besides, they would affect the tourist business.

My worst fears, the ones about the dark, were not realized. A subdued yellowish light filled the chamber into which we passed. It was barely bright enough to read by but certainly bright enough to find one’s way in, presumably a permanent installation fed from one of the country’s many nuclear generators.

Elaine and I walked on cautiously. Despite our attempts at stealth, our footsteps echoed from the ice walls and even our whispers seemed to fly around like bats. The layout of a castle was continued after we had passed through the portcullis and the main gate. This was a large courtyard. The floor was cut to resemble cobblestones and the walls were buttressed. A horse and carriage stood frozen, literally, while wax figures in costume stood poised to carry out their tasks.

“I thought we would have caught up with Janet by now,” Elaine murmured.

“So did I,” I agreed. “We could hardly have passed her so she must still be ahead of us.”

“Wherever that is.”

A door at either end was our next consideration. The first one I tried opened readily and we went through into the main hall. Trusses and beams were cut from the ice, and the open staircase on one side seemed ripe for a duel to be won by Douglas Fairbanks or Errol Flynn. Even the massive chandelier was chopped from the ice and the minstrel gallery that looked down on the scene below lacked only a group of medieval musicians.

“Listen!” Elaine snapped out the word so abruptly that I almost jumped out of my skin. She was right, there was … something. It resembled voices but no words were distinguishable, and the echoes from the ice mangled the sound beyond identification. There was no choice of doors here, just one large one. Elaine shrugged, opened it, and went through.

“Glad you could join us!” called out a welcoming voice. “Come on in and have a glass of champagne.”

It was a smaller room, though perhaps that was just the contrast from the spacious main hall. It was warmer too, because of the tapestries that hung all round the walls, screening off the chill from the ice. It was furnished like a luxurious club room, with carpets, large leather sofas and armchairs, small tables, and built-in wooden cabinets. It was brightly lit with floorlamps and overhead lighting.

“Cozy place you have here,” I commented as Elaine and I sank into one of the comfortable leather sofas.

On the wooden table before us was a bottle of Dom Perignon in a bucket of ice. Leighton Vance and Caroline de Witt occupied armchairs opposite us. Leighton rose and went to the wall cabinet, returning with two fluted glasses. He placed them in front of us and poured. He carefully topped them after waiting for the foam to subside.

“What shall we drink to?” Elaine asked brightly.

There was a silence. Leighton picked up his half-empty glass and drank most of it.

“The end of the line?” he suggested.

I glanced at Caroline de Witt. She looked as regal as ever, calm and composed but not inclined to join in the conversation, it seemed.

“You know most of it already, don’t you?” Leighton’s voice was measured, his utterance more statement than question.

“No, we don’t,” I said quickly. “We don’t know a thing. Just what are you doing down here? Brewing moonshine liquor? Plotting to overthrow the Swiss government? Forging thousand-franc notes?”

Leighton and Caroline looked at each other and laughed. Caroline drank some more champagne. “What are we doing down here?” chuckled Leighton. “Caroline and I? What a dreadfully gauche question!”

Elaine was less than amused. Her voice was a little touchy when she said to me in what was almost an aside, “It’s a love nest, we realize that.” To Leighton, she went on, “We also know that your real name is Lionel Fenton, and you are the former owner of the Bell’Aurora, a restaurant in northern New York State, where a dinner guest died from eating poisoned mushrooms.”

Neither Leighton nor Caroline reacted, but the silence was significant.

“Is that what this is all about?” I demanded. “You were accused of manslaughter but found not guilty. Kathleen Evans found out about it and blackmailed you into giving her free vacations here. You killed her in the Seaweed Forest and disposed of her body. …”

Leighton and Caroline exchanged laughs again. Leighton slapped his knee. “We murdered a magazine columnist over free vacations! That’s a good one!” He pointed to Elaine. “Your learned friend knows better than that.”

I looked at Elaine. She was torn between wanting to tell everything she knew and avoiding saying anything that might endanger our already precarious position. It would be a tough choice, I could see that in her face. I hoped she would decide correctly. Leighton didn’t know her as well as I did, and he misinterpreted her hesitation.

“You’d better tell him,” Leighton continued, still looking amused. “Accusing me of manslaughter, indeed! What an awful thing to do! Isn’t that grounds for slander?”

Caroline was joining in the amusement now, her red lips parted in a wide smile. All this joviality pressed Elaine into making up her mind.

“It wasn’t Leighton who was accused of poisoning the guest at the Bell’Aurora,” she said, not just to me but to the room at large. “He didn’t stand trial for manslaughter. It was Mallory.”

I was determined not to indicate any dissension in the ranks so I didn’t ask Elaine accusingly. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Elaine was aware that the words were on my tongue, though, and she said, mainly for my benefit, “I only just found out.”

Leighton refilled his glass, shaking his head sadly. “It’s hard for a man to keep something like this concealed for so long. I’ve kept quiet about it as far as I could but there comes a time …” He drank champagne with a flourish that illustrated drowning his sorrows.

“You’ll feel better if you tell the whole story,” I told him piously. “Confession is good for the soul.”

Caroline spoke up for the first time. “I’d better tell it. Leighton milks it. He and Mallory had this restaurant, the Bell’Aurora. It was getting to be really popular. Leighton’s partner, Edward Lester, had this crush on Mallory, wouldn’t leave her alone. She didn’t want to discuss it with Leighton—he has a jealous streak. She put some poisoned mushrooms in Lester’s salad. Perhaps she only intended to give him a scare. That’s what her lawyer said. Anyway, he died. Lester’s infatuation with Mallory was well known to the regulars and the restaurant staff. Several of them gave evidence, and she was tried for manslaughter. Her lawyer was good. She was found not guilty.”

“Mallory and I changed our names. We went to Canada, then to France, then came here to Switzerland.” Leighton took up the story, not wanting to be left out. “Kathleen Evans found us by accident. She was planning a story on husband-and-wife chefs. She came across the story of the Bell’Aurora and linked it to us. Naturally, we let her stay here for free rather than have the story leaked.”

“So you killed Kathleen to stop her from telling anyone you were here,” I said indignantly. “Let’s not lose sight of that!”

Caroline stretched back languidly in the big leather armchair. “It’s Leighton’s fatal charm. One of the girls has a passion for him—”

“Rhoda,” I supplied.

“Yes,” she said. “Rhoda turned the flagellation level up too high. We knew nothing about it until it was too late. We had to get rid of the body, of course.”

“Then Rhoda tried to get rid of me,” I reminded her. “In the mud baths. Fortunately, she failed.”

“Did she really?” Caroline looked surprised. “The girl is very zealous, I know, but that was going a little too far.”

“I couldn’t agree more.”

There was no keeping Elaine quiet for very long. “Tell us about Janet,” she invited.

“We were surprised when she showed up here,” Caroline said. “Presumably she decided to take up where Kathleen had left off.”

“And where is she now?”

Leighton and Caroline looked at each other. Caroline was the first to answer.