here with the new documents before the week is over.”
“You overlooked something, Great-grandfather,” said Betsy.
“Did I? What?”
“Me,” she said.
She jerked one of the pillows from under his head and jammed it down on his face. He struggled, but he was a weak hundred-year-old man, and she was twenty-six and strong enough to have played three sets of tennis that afternoon without getting winded.
Something good happened—good for her. She felt him stiffen and guessed he was having a coronary. Maybe he wouldn’t die of the pillow denying him breath. Maybe … She held the pillow in place, just the same, for five minutes. When she removed it, he was turning blue, and his eyes were staring lifelessly at the ceiling. To be certain he was gone, she sat beside him for another ten minutes, holding the pillow gently over his face so as not to bruise him.
3
She removed the tape cartridge from the VCR and wiped her fingerprints from the control switches.
He had not made this tape himself. Someone in the house, or someone elsewhere, had done it for him. It would not do for investigators to find missing only the tape showing her with Angelo. She began to move books. Sure enough, she found half a dozen more tape cartridges. She would have liked to see if one really showed Roberta beating her father’s naked ass, but she could not stay here and play tapes, and she could not risk keeping them.
She stepped onto the balcony outside Number One’s bedroom. The house was silent and mostly dark. She stood for a while, watching to see if anyone was outside. Detecting no one, she tossed all the tapes onto the lawn.
Outside, a few minutes later, she gathered them up. She walked to the edge of the beach. Then, inspired, she took off her tennis dress and panties and walked onto the sand stark naked, clutching the tape cartridges. If anyone saw her and wondered why she was moving so furtively, the explanation would be that she had decided to take a walk, nude, on the beach.
If she couldn’t find the remains of a fire, she would sit down and pull all the tape out of the cartridges. Then she would tear it to bits and scatter the bits in the surf.
But a hundred yards south she found what she had hoped she might find: the final glowing coals of someone’s fire. At the edge of the tide there were bits of driftwood, and palm frond. She gathered a little fuel. Keeping the fire low, she pulled the tape out of the cartridges—her own first—and laid it on the flames. The tape burned quickly, with a little more flare than she would have liked. When she had burned all the tapes, she let the heat melt the cartridges. She covered the melted mess with sand to cool it, and after a few minutes carried it out into the surf. She cast it out as far as she could, walked out of the water, and started back toward the house.
4
No one screamed. When she came downstairs in the morning, Roberta intercepted her before she reached the lanai and told her Number One had died in the night of a massive coronary.
“Well, he made his hundred years,” Betsy remarked. She had nothing more to say.
It was noon before the formalities were concluded. Even so, word had gone out over all the wires: Loren Hardeman the First was dead.
A telegram arrived from New York—
SHOCKED AND DISTRESSED TO LEARN OF DEATH OF LOREN HARDEMAN I. MY PERSONAL SYMPATHY TO ALL MEMBERS OF HIS FAMILY AND ALL HIS MANY FRIENDS, AMONG WHICH I INCLUDE MYSELF. HE WAS A GIANT OF THE AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY, WHICH WILL NEVER BE THE SAME WITHOUT HIM.
ANGELO PERINO
X
1978
1
Amanda Finch, who had painted her nude, drove Cindy down the sloping main street of Greenwich, Connecticut.
“I don’t know. I guess I’ve kind of fallen in love with this town,” she said. “There are a lot of artistic people here. Some celebrities. Sports figures. Entertainment people. The town is laid-back, easy to get along in. I think you’d like it, too.”
Cindy had decided she and Angelo had to move
“You overlooked something, Great-grandfather,” said Betsy.
“Did I? What?”
“Me,” she said.
She jerked one of the pillows from under his head and jammed it down on his face. He struggled, but he was a weak hundred-year-old man, and she was twenty-six and strong enough to have played three sets of tennis that afternoon without getting winded.
Something good happened—good for her. She felt him stiffen and guessed he was having a coronary. Maybe he wouldn’t die of the pillow denying him breath. Maybe … She held the pillow in place, just the same, for five minutes. When she removed it, he was turning blue, and his eyes were staring lifelessly at the ceiling. To be certain he was gone, she sat beside him for another ten minutes, holding the pillow gently over his face so as not to bruise him.
3
She removed the tape cartridge from the VCR and wiped her fingerprints from the control switches.
He had not made this tape himself. Someone in the house, or someone elsewhere, had done it for him. It would not do for investigators to find missing only the tape showing her with Angelo. She began to move books. Sure enough, she found half a dozen more tape cartridges. She would have liked to see if one really showed Roberta beating her father’s naked ass, but she could not stay here and play tapes, and she could not risk keeping them.
She stepped onto the balcony outside Number One’s bedroom. The house was silent and mostly dark. She stood for a while, watching to see if anyone was outside. Detecting no one, she tossed all the tapes onto the lawn.
Outside, a few minutes later, she gathered them up. She walked to the edge of the beach. Then, inspired, she took off her tennis dress and panties and walked onto the sand stark naked, clutching the tape cartridges. If anyone saw her and wondered why she was moving so furtively, the explanation would be that she had decided to take a walk, nude, on the beach.
If she couldn’t find the remains of a fire, she would sit down and pull all the tape out of the cartridges. Then she would tear it to bits and scatter the bits in the surf.
But a hundred yards south she found what she had hoped she might find: the final glowing coals of someone’s fire. At the edge of the tide there were bits of driftwood, and palm frond. She gathered a little fuel. Keeping the fire low, she pulled the tape out of the cartridges—her own first—and laid it on the flames. The tape burned quickly, with a little more flare than she would have liked. When she had burned all the tapes, she let the heat melt the cartridges. She covered the melted mess with sand to cool it, and after a few minutes carried it out into the surf. She cast it out as far as she could, walked out of the water, and started back toward the house.
4
No one screamed. When she came downstairs in the morning, Roberta intercepted her before she reached the lanai and told her Number One had died in the night of a massive coronary.
“Well, he made his hundred years,” Betsy remarked. She had nothing more to say.
It was noon before the formalities were concluded. Even so, word had gone out over all the wires: Loren Hardeman the First was dead.
A telegram arrived from New York—
SHOCKED AND DISTRESSED TO LEARN OF DEATH OF LOREN HARDEMAN I. MY PERSONAL SYMPATHY TO ALL MEMBERS OF HIS FAMILY AND ALL HIS MANY FRIENDS, AMONG WHICH I INCLUDE MYSELF. HE WAS A GIANT OF THE AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY, WHICH WILL NEVER BE THE SAME WITHOUT HIM.
ANGELO PERINO
X
1978
1
Amanda Finch, who had painted her nude, drove Cindy down the sloping main street of Greenwich, Connecticut.
“I don’t know. I guess I’ve kind of fallen in love with this town,” she said. “There are a lot of artistic people here. Some celebrities. Sports figures. Entertainment people. The town is laid-back, easy to get along in. I think you’d like it, too.”
Cindy had decided she and Angelo had to move
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