I closed the case, snapping the clasps. “Then we have to take it with us.”
Just then Fogerty emitted an unpleasant noise accompanied by a smell I knew too well. The human body has over sixty sphincters, and every one of them relaxes in death.
My usual remedy was a Brach’s Star Brites mint—easy to carry and not suspicious—but anything peppermint will do. I went into the bathroom and grabbed his toothpaste, dabbing a bit under my nose. I knelt next to him and went through his pockets. He had his crew lanyard stuffed into one but nothing else.
“He must have stashed his ID and money with his means of escape,” I told Helen. “We should get going.”
Helen and I exchanged glances, then she heaved a sigh and dragged the cover off his bed, snapping it out as she draped it on the floor. We rolled him into it, then maneuvered him into the wardrobe. When we finished, Helen sprayed lavishly from the bottle of cheap aftershave in his Dopp kit. I surveyed our handiwork. Anyone taking a quick glance would think he had left a bundle of dirty bedclothes stuffed into his wardrobe. It wouldn’t stand up to a close inspection, but it might buy us some time.
Helen took the case, tucking it carefully under her arm and draping her pashmina over it while I closed the door behind us. Helen and I made our way up two flights of stairs to our deck, careful to look like we were having a nonchalant chat as we went.
“Ladies!” Heather Fanning found us just as we reached my cabin. “Everything okay? We’re missing a swell dinner! There’s even a lovely rose petal rice congee for dessert.” She pitched her voice high, the way tiresome people do when they’re talking to anyone older than they can ever imagine being.
Helen turned to face her. “Thank you, dear. My friend has a touch of seasickness and I thought I’d see her to her cabin. She just needs a little lie-down.”
I hunched over, clutching my stomach, and Heather Fanning’s face puckered in distaste. “Oh, that is a shame! If you need the doctor, do let us know. In the meantime, we offer a full assortment of ginger-based natural remedies in the wellness shop on the Hygieia deck.”
I growled a little in the back of my throat.
“Thank you, dear,” Helen told her sweetly. “But I brought some edibles.”
She took the key card from my hand and swiped it viciously, shoving me inside the cabin and shutting the door firmly on Heather Fanning’s shocked face before I burst out laughing.
“Edibles?”
She went to put the attaché case down on Mary Alice’s bed. “I hate people like her. Talking to us like we’re toddlers.” Her voice rose in perfect mimicry. “You’re missing a swell dinner. Rice pudding for dessert!”
“She said it was a very lovely rose petal congee,” I reminded her.
“I don’t care what she calls it. It’s rice pudding, and I am so goddamned tired of being old.” She sat heavily on my bed, and I saw the glimmer of tears in her eyes. I went to the bathroom and got a hand towel. The ice bucket had been filled and left with an orchid on the console. I tossed the orchid aside and wrapped a handful of ice in the cloth. I brought it to Helen and laid it gently on the back of her head.
“You took a crack.”
She held it in place. “I suppose it’s no use complaining about feeling decrepit when there’s a bomb ticking down five feet away and I may never get any older,” she said reasonably. “It’s just that ever since Kenneth died, I’ve aged twenty years. I can’t even touch my toes anymore, let alone do what you just did,” she added in an accusing tone.
“Helen, cut yourself some slack. I didn’t lose the love of my life. Mourning is a bitch. And it’s a process. You’re just not finished with it.”
“That’s the point,” she said. “I think I am. At least I want to be. I am so sick and tired of waking up feeling like someone tore off one of my limbs. Every morning, for just a few seconds, I forget. I wake up and it hasn’t happened yet. There’s nothing but emptiness and calm. And then it comes crashing down and I hate it. I hate it so much.”
I sat next to her, shoulder to shoulder. “I’m sorry. I know that doesn’t help.”
“No, it doesn’t,” she said. “Not even a little. It feels like a physical weight, something that somebody thrust into my arms and made me carry. I didn’t ask for this. I wish I could break pieces of it off and hand them over to other people. Let them have their turn.”
“We all have our turn in the end,” I said. I put my arm around her, trying not to feel how little flesh was left on her bones. If I blew hard enough, I could send her tumbling away like a dandelion seed. God only knew where she would land.