He broke off, sobbing and disconsolate, and slumped against the gray wall. I wanted to hold him, to offer him comfort, but my feet were welded to the floor, my hands Superglued to my hips. I didn't know what to do or say.
"I love her," Jeremy went on hopelessly. "What'll I do if she dies? Oh God, what'll Karen and I do then?"
It was a despairing, gut-wrenching plea for help, for answers. I wanted to say, "Snap out of it, Jeremy. Pull yourself together. Don't even think such a thing." I'm superstitious enough to believe that giving way to such thoughts can open the door for potential disaster.
At last my hands moved, almost of their own volition. I reached out and put one arm across Jeremy Todd Cartwright's quaking shoulder.
"You make do," I said slowly. "You take it one day at a time and do the very best you can for you and for your child."
Jeremy shuddered in a herculean effort to pull himself together. "Is that what you did after your second wife died?"
So Kelly had told him about Anne Corley, about what had happened between us. Anne wasn't exactly a deep-dark family secret, but it startled me to hear Jeremy mention her. It felt strange to be discussing her with a young man I hardly knew, but then I realized that the pain of what had happened to me then uniquely qualified me to help Jeremy now.
"Pretty much," I said.
He was silent for a time. "Do you think she'll die?"
"I don't know. What do the doctors say?"
"The doctors don't talk to me," he snorted bitterly. "They talk to your wife-excuse me, to your ex-wife, to Kelly's mother, but not to me. I'm only the father here, not the husband."
Once more he dissolved in anguished tears. Jeremy Cartwright was a boy in man's clothing. My heart went out to him. This time, I wrapped both arms around his broad shoulders and held him close. He clung to me desperately, like a small frightened child, even though he stood a good two inches taller than I am. Hot tears coursed down the back of my shirt, leaking under my collar and trickling in tiny rivulets between my shoulder blades. At last he quieted and pulled away.
"Come on," I said, taking his arm. "Let's go outside."
"I can't leave," he objected. "She's still in the O.R."
"Just outside to get some air," I told him. "It'll do you good. Someone will come find you if you're needed."
I led him out to the same concrete bench where I had sat some hours earlier. The sun had moved far to the west and was headed down behind the line of encircling hills. Despite sitting in the hot afternoon air where the temperature still hovered in the high 90s, Jeremy shivered uncontrollably.
"Cold?" I asked.
He nodded. "How can that be?" He stared down at the film of gooseflesh covering his arms.
"A kind of delayed shock, maybe," I suggested.
He balled his hands into fists, watching them open and close with puzzled interest, as though they were unfamiliar appendages attached to some alien body.
"I called the hotel and canceled our reservation," he said huskily. "Since we can't use the room, I didn't want to pay for it. We can't afford it. I don't know how we're going to pay the hospital bill. We had budgeted enough for the baby, but this…" He broke off, shaking his head.
"You don't have hospitalization?"
"For me," he answered, "but not for Kelly and the baby. I couldn't add dependent coverage because we weren't married."
"It'll be all right," I said. "Don't worry about that."
Gordon Fraymore came out through the hospital doors just then, looked around, spotted us, and then started in our direction. "They want you inside," he said when he reached us.
"Both of us?" I asked.
"No, him." Fraymore nodded curtly toward Jeremy, who rose at once and rabbited away. Uninvited, the detective took Jeremy's vacated spot on the bench. First he popped a Tums, then he lit a cigarette.
"I'm pissed at you, Beaumont," he said evenly enough. "So's the county sheriff, for that matter. I just thought you should know."
The word "mister" had evidently disappeared from Gordon Fraymore's lexicon.
"The sheriff? How come he's mad at me? I don't even know him."
"Believe me, he knows you," Fraymore said. "I gave him the full scoop. Live Oak Farm's in the county, so Daphne Lewis is theirs same as Martin Shore is mine. We figure the two homicides are related, so we're conducting a joint operation."
Great. Complete stranger or not, whoever the sheriff of Jackson County was, he already hated my guts. Gordon Fraymore had seen to it.
"So why are you bent out of shape?"
"Because you held out on me, for one thing. Why didn't you tell me Tanya Dunseth had some kind of beef going with Daphne Lewis?"
"Because I didn't know."
"Like hell you didn't!" Fraymore returned more forcefully. "We've talked to several people who were in the Members' Lounge the other night. They all tell me the same thing-that Tanya Dunseth fell all apart as soon as Daphne Lewis walked into the room. You were there. You must have seen it."
He had me dead to rights. I nodded. "There was a reaction, but I couldn't tell for sure if it was because of Daphne or because of Guy," I returned. "They came in together. For all I know, it could have been either one of them or both."
"You should have told me about it," Fraymore insisted.
"You're talking twenty-twenty hindsight," I said. "At the time it happened, nobody was dead yet. Later, after Martin Shore died, there was no way to tie those two incidents together. Besides, it didn't seem like that big a deal. I still don't see any connection."
"The connection is none of your business, but it is a big deal," Fraymore countered. "A woman's dead, dammit. I'm tempted to file obstruction charges against you."
"Give me a break. You know as well as I do that if I had volunteered any information, you would have climbed my frame for violating your turf."
Fraymore frowned and seemed to consider. Finally, he said, "I'll think about giving you that break. In the meantime, you'd better tell me everything you know."
"Like what?"
"Like what the hell happened at that party-and I do mean everything."
"We were still in the Members' Lounge waiting for Henry to get out when Tanya came in with that young actor who plays Romeo. She happened to sit down next to me. We started visiting."
"Another coincidence, I suppose?" Fraymore ventured dryly.
"Hardly. She and my daughter are friends. Kelly takes care of Amber, Tanya's daughter. We were still chatting when the Lewises came in. When Tanya saw Daphne and Guy, she looked like she'd seen a ghost. She was so startled she spilled her drink."
"Did she say anything to you about them?"
"No."
"Did she talk to them?"
"No, not at all. As soon as she saw them, she took off. I thought she was going to the bar to refill her drink, but she left the party completely."
"And didn't come back?"
"No."
"Did she show up later at the Bowmer?"
"She might have, but I didn't see her there."
"Let's go back to the Lewises. Did they speak to you?"
"Briefly. We exchanged a few words."
"What about?"
"Mostly about cars, as I recall."
"Cars? Did they say anything to you about Tanya?"
"Not really. Guy mentioned that he had seen her play Juliet and thought she was very good."
"He didn't hint around that something might be going on between either himself and Tanya or Daphne and Tanya?"
"No, not at all. Why don't you ask Guy Lewis about it?" I asked. "Maybe he knows."
"Guy Lewis left town."
"Oh," I said. It didn't seem wise to mention to Gordon Fraymore that I already had spoken to the desk clerk at the Mark Anthony and had learned that very thing. If the detective discovered I'd been nosing around on Guy Lewis' tail, my already shaky situation would deteriorate immeasurably.