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the fishing hat, haggling over the room rates at the front
desk. His hat was pulled down so low, the top half of his
head was hidden.
Seventy dollars is our lowest senior rate, Sondra
told him.
Senior rate? Now, that was romantic. How old was
Lover Boy?
Come on, honey, you can give us a better deal than
that, he whined. Who else is going to stay here?
Sixty-seven fifty, Sondra said.
Done, he said, and counted out the cash. Afford
able adultery.
Was that someone else s wife waiting in the car?
Helen wondered. Sondra thought the man was sneaking
around, and she d seen plenty of guilty couples. Was Ar
lene indulging in a little garden-variety blackmail?
Helen swung the camera away from the front desk
before the sneaky man saw her. Snack bar now, she
said, using the hotel s grand name for the cluster of
vending machines. Helen watched a kid wearing baggy
shorts and a rumpled T-shirt try to slide a dollar bill into
the soda machine. It spit the money back. Was this some
sort of vending machine scam? Why video it? The kid
Murder with Reservations ] 209
turned the bill around, stuck the money in again, and
scored a Mountain Dew. Then he slouched over to the
pay phones with a calling card.
Pay phones. Helen swung the camera to the phones
on the wall, while the surly kid punched in numbers.
He looked up, saw Helen with the camcorder, and
said, Hey, bitch, do you mind? The kid s hand was
cupped over the calling card.
Do I mind what? Helen said, the video camera still
trained on his face. It was blotched with anger and zits.
Do you fucking mind not shoulder surfing? Manners
evaporated after a certain age, even in the Midwest.
What s shoulder surfing? Helen asked, lowering
the camera.
The kid clenched his long, skinny fingers protec
tively over the card face. You know what it is. Put that
camcorder down or I ll call the fucking cops. It s bad
enough I lost my cell phone when I got grounded and
I m stuck with a fucking calling card. Now every asshole
with a camcorder thinks he can steal my card numbers.
I already got ripped off at a turnpike rest stop. My dad
bitched me out for being careless. Drop the fucking
camcorder or I ll call 911.
The kid s words suddenly skidded to a halt, as if he
was surprised to be saying so much. Helen suspected he
communicated with adults mostly by grunts and single
syllables. She turned off her camera. Thank you, she
said. Thank you very much.
The kid stood there openmouthed, but that may have
been his usual expression.
Helen ran back to Margery and Peggy, who were
once more pacing the lobby.
I ve got it! I think Arlene was shoulder surfing.
What? Peggy and Margery said together.
She was stealing calling card and credit card num
bers with a video camera.
I ll be damned, Margery said.
It makes sense, Peggy said. She was starting to show
210 ] Elaine Viets
signs of life again. Maybe Margery s folly made her feel
better about her own mistake. That s why she hung
around vacation hotels and cultivated that harmless-
tourist act with the knitting and the video cam. She took
a bunch of innocent pictures, then swung the camera
toward the phone bank.
Well, well, it s time to have a talk with her, Margery
said.
Unless she s run off with Glenn, Peggy said. She
was getting used to the idea of losing her man.
Maybe she s at home watching TV, Helen said.
Margery fixed her with a glare. Do you believe
that?
Uh, no, Helen said.
Then let s quit wasting time and go home.
Margery drove to the Coronado as if she got a bonus
for running yellow lights. She stopped by her apartment
just long enough to grab her passkey.
Helen and Peggy followed her up the stairs to 2C,
then stood back while Margery pounded on the door.
There was no answer.
Helen felt sick, and leaned against the wall.
Margery looked over at her. What s wrong with
you?
I m getting a complex, Helen said. Every time
somebody knocks on a door, the people inside have ei
ther skipped or died.
If that crook Arlene skipped, she s going to wish she
was dead, Margery growled. She banged on the door
again. No answer. I m going in. Margery unlocked
the door with her passkey. The sharp, dizzying odor of
bleach, ammonia and lemon polish poured out.
That s one good thing about renting to crooks,
Margery said. They always clean up any fingerprints
when they split.
Helen and Peggy followed her inside. The apartment
looked ready to show. The tabletops and counters spar
kled. The floor was shiny clean.
Murder with Reservations ] 211
She s gone, Margery said.
She take the towels? Helen said. The residents of
2C usually departed with souvenirs.
Nope. She got my whistling teakettle and the sea
shell mirror.
Helen saw the blank spot on the wall by the front
door and the empty stove burner.
But I got first and last month s rent and a cleaning
deposit, Margery said. I won t lose any money. But I
liked that mirror.
Too bad she got away, Helen said.
She left, Margery said. That doesn t mean she got
away.
$)"15&3
hey grabbed those children and ran out of this
hotel like the devil was chasing them, Sondra
Tsaid.
Who? Helen said. She d walked in on Sondra and
Craig at the front desk.
That nice family from the Midwest, Sondra said.
I don t know how they found out about the deaths,
but they packed up and left at two thirty this morning.
Wouldn t even wait until daylight. Sybil was on duty. She
said they acted like she was going to murder them in
their beds.
The hotel was unnaturally quiet for eight thirty in the
morning. There was no line of impatient travelers at the
front desk. No guests waited for the elevator. No one
poured coffee or nuked a cinnamon roll in the break
fast room. The room s TV was off, too. The employees
couldn t bear to watch the morning news.
Did the other couples check out, too? Helen said.
All gone. The hotel is empty, Sondra said. All our
reservations are canceled for the next month. We have
fifty-two rooms to clean today, but then there s no work.
Sybil says she ll put you both on vacation pay for a week.
After that, you may have to look for another job if busi
ness doesn t pick up.
Murder with Reservations ] 213
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