“Wouldn't the person making the switch need an accomplice to create the diversion?” Sandra asked.
“Probably not. Because timing is so critical it's better for the switcher to create the diversion herself because she knows exactly when to do it. All she has to do is to say something that gets people to look away from her.”
Our young waitress arrived to take our dessert orders. She offered us a choice of cake, ice cream or fruit. I usually ordered an apple or an orange, figuring that I ate enough rich desserts of my own baking.
Mark said, “Does the cake taste as good as you look?”
The girl smiled, self-consciously, and drawled, in a local accent, “It tastes yummy. I had some, myself.”
Sandra frowned and I surmised that Mark's engaging manner with women was still a sticking point with her.
While we waited for dessert, I took the kids on the rest of our rounds. We went to the table where Ellen sat with another woman. I was concerned about how she would receive me so I just said, “Ellen, I'm taking a count of bridge players for tomorrow. Are you planning to be there?”
She said yes without smiling so I didn't introduce Sandra and Mark. We went to the table where Harriet and two other women were eating. She also said that she would be present at the bridge club. I did introduce Sandra and Mark to her and we got introduced to her dinner mates, in turn.
Before we left, I said, “By the way, Harriet, would you like to be my partner tomorrow? I think it's a good idea to change partners once in a while and I've always wanted to play with you.”
“I'd like that very much,” Harriet said. “I usually played with Gerald while he…was alive. Since then I've been playing with Laura. Confidentially,” she lowered her voice as though people were listening, “I don't like the way she bids.”
“We'll sic Tess on her,” I said. “Tess will straighten her out.”
When we returned to our table I glanced at Mark to get his reaction. He said, “I can't eliminate either one of them on the basis of size. I'd like to see them stand up.”
“If we wait long enough, they'll do that,” I said. “What about hair color?” Ellen had reddish-brown hair; Harriet's hair was white.
“Remember, the woman I delivered the lobster to wore a sun hat that completely covered her hair. If she had any loose ends sticking out I didn't notice them.”
I ordered coffee and we dawdled over dessert. Finally, the ladies in question did stand up and leave, one at a time. Mark's final judgment after he watched them was that he could have delivered the lobster to either one of them.
CHAPTER 18
On Wednesday morning I told Tess that I wanted to play with Harriet as a partner for that afternoon's bridge session, instead of her. She could play with Laura, Harriet's usual partner. Tess acquiesced, knowing I was up to something.
As part of my assistantship to Wesley I numbered the partnerships and set up a schedule so that each partnership played a certain number of hands against every other partnership during the course of the afternoon. Wesley was glad to let me do this because as a retired CPA his forte was rows and columns of numbers, not logic.
I needed two things to happen for my plan to work. One was out of my control, namely that Ida and Ellen were still partners. I could have asked Ida at dinner the night before but when I talked to her I hadn't put my plan together yet. That came after Mark expounded on deck-switching techniques. And even though I had talked to Ellen after that I wasn't about to ask her. Since Ellen and Ida had been partners for at least two years, the odds were in my favor.
The other thing, which I had at least partial control over, was that when Harriet and I played against Ida and Ellen, we would play at the same table and in the same positions as the day of Gerald's death. I was substituting for Gerald.
I arrived at the recreation room early and found Joe Turner, the handsome facilities manager, busily measuring with a retractable tape measure. He had his back to me and I self-consciously patted my hair and wished I didn't look like an old lady.
I tried to think of a clever way to start a conversation, but what came out was, “Are you going to enlarge the room to hold more bridge tables?”
Joe chuckled and turned toward me, saying, “No, we're actually going to replace some of the heating ducts below the floor, but since I don't feel like crawling around down there I'm measuring up here. Something like the guy who loses his wallet in an alley but looks for it underneath a streetlight because the light is better there.”
I fumbled for a riposte, but before I could come up with one the other bridge players began to arrive. Joe took his clipboard and tape measure and left; I hadn't even introduced myself.
I went to work, assigning numbers to each partnership and giving them their schedules. Fortunately, Ida confirmed that she and Ellen were playing together. I gave her the number and schedule I had prearranged for them.
My plan was to have the critical match-up occur in the middle of the session. It was easier to do then than at the beginning and I didn't think the timing mattered, especially since we weren't eating lunch first.
When the time came, Harriet and I were already seated at the key table from the previous round. I occupied Gerald's chair and Harriet sat where she had been on the fatal day.
I signaled Tess, who sat at another table, during the changeover and she started talking to Ellen to delay her for a minute. I had told her she could apologize to Ellen for my behavior at lunch on Monday, if she wanted to, but I couldn't hear what she actually said.
As Ida ambled over to our table she headed toward the wrong chair. I said, “Ida, sit over here so you can legally shuffle this deck, since Ellen has been waylaid.” I dealt first, just as Gerald had done, and I wanted Ida to shuffle, just as she had done.
Ida complied with my request. A minute later Ellen came over and sat down in her assigned seat and placed her purse in her lap. She didn't look at me. Ida finished shuffling the cards and placed the deck on the table to my left. At that point could she have created a diversion and switched the cards? Possibly. Although Ida was a bit clumsy and it was difficult to picture her doing anything that required sleight-of-hand. And if she had accomplished the switch, Gerald would have had to deal the cards without Ellen cutting the deck, which was unlikely.
I picked up the deck and placed it on the table to my right, inviting Ellen to cut. She cut the cards neatly and efficiently. I had always admired her dexterity, as demonstrated by the smoothness of her shuffling technique. As she cut I heard a voice in my mind call out: “Those napkins are going to catch on fire!”
That's what somebody from this table had yelled just before Gerald had started choking-just before the hand had been dealt. I was sure of the timing because I, as the dealer at another table, had been about to deal the first hand, also. And I was 95 percent sure Ellen had been the yeller.
As I picked up the deck I reviewed the situation: Ellen sat facing the table where the lunch had been served. She was also the farthest person from the table in the room. The warning had focused the attention of everybody in the room on the table-and away from Ellen.
I could picture her sliding the deck into the purse on her lap and replacing it with another deck, using both hands in one quick movement. She had the kind of deftness that would have made it easy for her. And during the momentary confusion nobody would have noticed.
Ellen had been sending a signal to Gerald. She was telling him that trouble was going to follow, just as it had that time long ago when Gerald had been dealt 13 diamonds. To be specific, Ellen was telling Gerald that she was his killer! As soon as he started to choke it must have become clear to him-but by that time it was too late for him to do anything about it.
“Lillian, are you in a fog? Come on, deal the cards. We don't have all afternoon.”