Dreams of Jeannie and Other Stories Part 19

Faith stifled a retort, and then forgot what she was going to say anyway.

An argument between two men on the other side of the pool became loud enough to catch her attention. One of the men was short and gnomish, with a dark goatee. He was wearing a well-tailored, silky jacket over a black turtleneck s.h.i.+rt. A purple beret was perched rakishly on a head slightly too large for his body. The other was a heavy-set, gray-haired man in a green polo s.h.i.+rt who could have been the twin of the one at the front desk. People all around them became quiet as well, listening as the heat rose.

"Avery Whitlock would throw you out on your ear," the larger man shouted. "He wouldn't have put up with this kind of heresy in his house."

"Whitlock was a gentleman," the gnome shouted in return. "He was gracious to everyone. And he must be spinning in his grave at the thought that narrow-minded, reactionary boors are running his foundation."

"Actually, Avery was cremated," a woman standing near Faith muttered. "His ashes are in an urn on the mantel, under his portrait."

Faith glanced over at the woman and was relieved to note that she was talking to someone else. The woman and her male companion met the appearance standard that Faith had expected to find in astrologers. The woman, a slender blonde with the kind of heavy makeup that doesn't really hide lines around the eyes, was dressed in several layers of leopard print gauze. Sheena, queen of the jungle, twenty years past her prime, Faith thought. The man, bald and bearded, sported an Hawaiian floral s.h.i.+rt and a bright green feathered earring that dangled from his left ear almost to his shoulder.

"The astrology that was good enough for Ptolemy was good enough for Avery Whitlock." The heavy-set man was turning purple.

"Are you suggesting that Ptolemy knew the sun was the center of the solar system? And he secretly discovered the outer planets? Avery's astrology was heliocentric, he incorporated Pluto into his charts, and he would have been open-minded where the influence of Chiron, Ceres, and the other asteroids is concerned. And you know it." The gnomish man wasn't giving ground.

"But not the Beatles! Saying that the cl.u.s.ter of four asteroids named after the Beatles can influence the development of musical talent is making a mockery of everything we do, everything Avery Whitlock stood for." The large man's voice was full of agony.

"Avery embraced Jung. He believed that synchronicities happen because everything in a time period is connected with everything else in that time period. Thus, the four asteroids were named for the four Beatles because they emanate cosmic rays that influence the development of musical talent, whether the naming scientists knew it or not," the gnomish man replied. "And Avery would have understood that. If you hadn't connived with the attorneys when he was old and tired, he would have made me the trustee, not you, and you know it!"

The gray-haired man stepped back, gasping, speechless.

The smaller man raised both fists in a gesture of triumph.

A few people laughed, and one woman applauded.

"Right on, Carlo!" she called.

The small man bowed in her direction. The heavy-set one turned and walked away from the pool, beyond the lighted area, still struggling for breath.

"I guess I can skip the discussion group on the influence of the asteroids," Michael said.

Faith nodded, but she was more interested in the couple next to her.

"How could you have married him?" the man with the earring asked.

"Carlo is brilliant, really. And I knew as soon as I saw his chart, with the conjunction of his Mars, my Venus, that we had been destined to meet, and that something significant would happen as a result," the Sheena-woman answered. "He was so difficult, though, that I made sure we got married when Mercury was retrograde. I knew I'd want out sooner or later."

"Seven years is a long later," the man said. "Although I guess it was a lucrative seven years."

The Sheena-woman glared. "I earned my money, Kevin."

Kevin leaned over and kissed her cheek. "Yes, dear. Anyone married to an astrologer who stakes his reputation on a comet hitting Rome, without bothering to consult Avery Whitlock first, has earned her money."

The woman jerked her cheek away.

"Avery adored Carlo," she said. "He was amused at Carlo's error over the comet and took the opportunity to point out that Aquarius was the sign of geniuses and fools, and Carlo was simply being both at the same time. And he did give us reason to believe that we would be the trustees of his estate."

"We? You and Carlo?"

"Avery saw us as married on the level of spirit, no matter what we were doing on the mundane level," the woman replied.

"Is that why you didn't feel the need to save any of your earned money? You thought you'd have Avery's trust to loot?" Kevin sounded almost amused. "You were way down on the list, my dear."

Faith didn't hear what the Sheena-woman said next, but it wiped the smile off Kevin's face.

"All right, everybody," a man's voice called from the doorway to the house. "I hope you've all decided which group you're going to, because it's time to get started."

The Sheena-woman started toward the house, Kevin following.

"Where are you going?" Michael asked.

"Oh, the psychology one, of course," Faith said. "What about you?"

"That's the only one I have a prayer of understanding," Michael replied.

"I'll meet you back here afterward, then," Bobby said. "And I'll take notes on compatibility charts so that I can tell you about them on the way home."

The three of them held back, not wanting to push past the people who clearly knew their destinations. They moved to the doorway only when there was s.p.a.ce to do so comfortably.

The man who had called out was the same one who had checked them in, the apparent twin of the man who had been arguing with Carlo. Faith held out her sheet of paper to him, pointing to the astrological psychology discussion group. He glanced at the paper, then back at her.

"Up the stairs, all the way to the front of the house, door to the right," he said.

More people had come into the house while the poolside argument was going on, and now everyone from house and yard had converged on the stairs at the same time. Faith and Michael pulled back again to avoid the bottleneck.

"Do you remember something about an astrologer predicting a comet would hit Rome?" she asked.

"The fas.h.i.+on designer, Carlo Firenza," Michael said. "I heard he went bankrupt, too. Not exactly Nostradamus. Is that the same Carlo as the little man by the pool?"

"I think so. I wonder who the twins are."

"They're not really twins, but they are brothers," a man interjected. "Larry and Ed Martin. The one who acts as gatekeeper is Ed. They're the trustees of Whitlock's estate."

Faith flushed when she realized that Kevin was standing next to her. He was smiling to let her know that he hadn't taken offense at her eavesdropping, and was merely replying in kind.

"Thank you," she said. "It's our first time here, and we don't know who anyone is. I'm Faith Ca.s.sidy, this is Michael Haver."

"Kevin Solis," he said, holding out his hand to each. "I believe I heard you say something about going to the astrological psychology discussion."

"Yes, we did," Faith said, returning his smile.

"You will have an interesting evening. Sophia leads that group." Kevin's feathered earring bobbed against his neck. It looked a little less festive than it had earlier.

"Sophia?"

"The former Signore Firenza. She was a student of astrology long before she met Carlo."

"And psychology?" Faith asked.

"That, too," Kevin answered. "She knew one of Jung's mistresses quite well, in fact."

"I can hardly wait," Michael said.

"Then you'd best move along," Kevin said. "She'll want to start on time."

Faith nodded her thanks to Kevin and moved away. The bottleneck had begun to clear, and she and Michael were able to start the ascent to the second floor.

They hadn't quite reached the landing when a piercing scream from the pool area stopped the entire group on the spot.

A second scream followed the first.

The stream of people stopped moving. Faith and Michael were stuck.

"Somebody call the paramedics!" a man's voice cried.

Murmurs of distress began to ripple up and down the stairs.

"Does anyone know CPR?"

"What happened?"

"It's Larry. He fell and hit his head. They found him in the hot tub."

"Is he all right?"

"Well, no."

The woman in the tailored suit who had been at the front desk threaded her way to the foot of the stairs.

"Please go ahead to your discussion groups," she said, her voice loud and tense. "We'll send someone around to let you know about Larry after the paramedics have seen him."

"And Larry was...?" Michael whispered to Faith.

"The one in the argument with Carlo," she whispered back.

The line began to move upstairs, and Faith and Michael were pushed up to the second floor.

A siren wailed briefly outside, ending in abrupt silence.

"I've changed my mind about the discussion group," Faith said. "I really want to know what's going on."

Michael shook his head. "Probably nothing, and it's none of our business."

"You're right. But suppose they were really arguing about the trust, not the asteroids? Suppose neither one was willing to let it go? I'll just feel better if I know it was really an accident," Faith said.

She turned sideways to squeeze past the people who were still coming up the stairs, and Michael followed.

Once she reached the back door, Faith felt a momentary lurch, as if she had gone back in time. The gnome and the large man were again arguing on the far side of the pool. But this time Carlo was arguing with Ed.

"You pushed him!" Ed shouted. "Larry didn't slip-you pushed him!"

"Larry was fat and clumsy," Carlo shouted in return. "Like you! Oafs! Both of you! I was nowhere near him! He fell!"

Faith looked around to see where the hot tub might be. There were steps leading up to a deck at the end of the house, and three people with worried expressions stood watching some activity.

"Ed wouldn't have gone anywhere near the hot tub on his own," Larry shouted. "You lured him up there and pushed him in! You hate us both!"

"Yes! I hate you both! And Ed wouldn't have done anything I asked him to do," Carlo shouted. "And he's bigger than I am! He would have pushed me in the hot tub!"

"Carlo! Ed! Stop it right now!" Sophia was suddenly in the doorway next to Faith. She paused until everyone's attention was on her, then proceeded toward the two men. "We don't know that anyone pushed Larry. How is he doing?"

"Not good," said one of the people near the deck. "The paramedics haven't been able to revive him."

"Murderer!" Ed screamed. "Police! Someone call the police!"

"Someone already has," the man near the deck said.

"Not me!" Carlo shouted. "I am not a murderer! Sophia! Sophia has Pluto conjuncting Mars in her twelfth house! Sophia is capable of murder!"

"And I was upstairs ready to begin the meeting," Sophia said calmly. "Whoever pushed Larry into the tub-if anyone pushed Larry into the tub-I didn't. You are the one with the most to gain from Larry's death, Ed, and you have Pluto squaring Mars, so stop the accusations right now!"

Faith edged her way toward the deck.

Michael grabbed her arm, but she shook his hand off.

"There's still one other person who has a stake in this," she whispered. "The other person who wanted to be trustee."

"And the police will find him," Michael whispered back.

"But the evidence may be gone by then."

"What evidence?" Michael said it a little too loud, and Faith shushed him.

The deck was raised about three feet off the ground, so that inhabitants of the master bedroom could walk out through a pair of French doors to the hot tub. Larry Martin's body was on the polished wood. One paramedic was on top of him, still performing CPR, the other one knelt beside. Several people were on the stairs, blocking access.

Faith stayed on the lawn and walked around to the spot nearest the hot tub. She bent over slightly so that her eyes were almost level with the deck. Although she needed gla.s.ses for reading, her distance vision was good, and she almost immediately spotted what she was looking for.

"There!" she whispered. "Caught on the edge of the tub!"

"What?"

"The green feather." She straightened up and backed away from the deck to make certain that only Michael heard her. "Kevin went into the house ahead of us, but he somehow ended up behind us when we were getting ready to go up the stairs. He's the one who confronted Larry Martin by the hot tub."

"And thank you for finding the one thing that connected me." Kevin had been part of the group on the stairs, hidden by the others. Now he was beside them. "I have a gun. Please walk slowly around the side of the house."

"You have a gun? At an astrology meeting?" Even as Faith asked the question, she felt the barrel jam into her back.

"I'm a reserve sheriffs deputy," Kevin replied. "I always have a gun. And I know how to use it, although I'd rather not."