Fresh Disasters

35

Stone and Celia arrived at the Mayflower Inn for dinner. He loved the place, and always looked forward to the perfume of wood-burning fireplaces as he entered. The inn had originally been designed as a school by Erich Rossiter, the same architect who designed Stone’s house, and had been expensively converted to its new use by a local couple with deep pockets. It was handsome, gracious, welcoming, and the food was good.

They were seated in the dining room and ordered drinks. Stone was still feeling the glow from the massage, augmented by the warmth of the painkiller, when he ordered a cosmopolitan for Celia and his second bourbon of the evening.

The room was full, not unusual on a Friday evening, when the overflow spilled into the adjacent bar, where a pianist could be heard tinkling away.

“Gosh, I feel good.” Stone sighed.

“Thank you,” Celia said. “I will take that as a compliment.”

“As well you should,” Stone replied, smiling and waving at a neighbor couple a few tables away. “I’m ready to supply a written recommendation, should you ever need one.”

“For the massage or the sex?” she asked, stroking the inside of his thigh under the table.

“Both.”

They ordered, and their first course arrived. When they had finished it, Celia excused herself and departed for the ladies’ room. Stone sat sipping his wine, happy in his cocoon of well-being. Then Celia returned to the table and sat down, looking flustered.

“Something wrong?” Stone asked.

“Devlin Daltry is in the bar,” she said. “I saw him as I passed the door.”

A flush of anger swept through Stone. “Did he see you?”

“No, I’m sure he didn’t.”

“I’ll be right back,” Stone said.

She tugged at his sleeve. “Don’t make a scene,” she said. “He revels in that sort of public misbehavior.”

“Don’t worry,” Stone said. He walked to the men’s room and paused at the door for a glimpse into the bar. Daltry was sitting on a stool, talking to a pretty girl next to him. Stone used the men’s room, then paused again on leaving. Daltry was still there, and he hadn’t seen Stone.

Stone walked to the front door and out into the night. A car had just pulled up, and its occupants were walking into the inn as the valet parker drove away their car. Stone found himself alone on the porch. A few cars to his left, he saw the white BMW M6 parked. He looked around once again to be sure he was alone, then he walked down to the car and quickly unscrewed the valve covers from the two tires facing away from the inn’s front door, found a twig and let the air out of both tires. He stood up and looked around. He was still alone. He started back toward the door, when suddenly his anger overwhelmed him. The parking lot was lined with a row of stones the size of soccer balls. He walked to the front of the BMW, picked up one of the stones and, with some effort, heaved it through the windshield of the car. The crash was surprisingly muted, and Stone walked back into the inn, leaving the rock in the driver’s seat. He encountered no one, and he glanced into the bar again. Daltry had his back to the door. Stone rejoined Celia.

“What did you do?” she asked.

“Nothing. I saw him but thought better of speaking to him.” He was giddy with elation at what he had done.

They finished their main course and coffee, and Stone gave his parking ticket to the waiter as the check arrived. “Please give this to the valet,” he said. “We’ll be there in a moment.”

When they departed the inn, the valet was there with Stone’s car. They got in and drove slowly back to the house. By the time they were inside, Stone’s elation had swung the other way. What had he done? Letting the air out of the man’s tires was a stupid, juvenile prank, but heaving the rock through the windshield was insane. If anyone had seen him, he’d have been arrested. What had he been thinking?

They went upstairs, and as Stone was emptying his pockets, he came up with the bottle of painkillers and looked at the label. “Do not take in conjunction with alcohol,” it read.

Good God, he thought. Eliza was right; he had run amok! And Daltry was going to go nuts when he saw his car. It would be easy enough for him to learn that Stone and Celia had had dinner at the inn, and he would certainly put two and two together. He would react badly.

Stone fell into bed, exhausted, and Celia was miffed at his inattention.

Stone was awakened early the following morning by the doorbell. By the time he got into a robe, it was ringing again. He slipped the little.380 out of its holder and into the pocket of his robe, then went downstairs to confront Devlin Daltry.

Instead, he found a state trooper on his doorstep, a man he knew, who served as the local constable. He opened the door. “Good morning, Harry,” he said.

“Good morning, Stone,” the trooper replied. “Sorry to get you up, but I have to ask you something.”

“Go right ahead.”

“Did you have dinner at the Mayflower last evening?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Did you encounter a man named Devlin Daltry?”

“No, I did not.”

“Do you know Mr. Daltry?”

“I’m afraid I do.”

“Did you do something to Mr. Devlin’s car, a white BMW?”

“No, I didn’t. I wasn’t even aware of such a car.”

“It was parked in front of the inn, and someone let the air out of two tires and threw a large rock through the windshield.”

“That’s unfortunate,” Stone said. “There was a parking attendant; didn’t he see anything?”

“No. He was parking another car.”

“And you suspect me of doing this?”

“Mr. Daltry suspects you. He made a report, so I had to look into it.”

“I understand, Harry. You should know that Mr. Daltry is unbalanced. He has been stalking the woman who is my house guest at the moment; she’s had to take out a TRO against him. He’s behaved in the same way with other women, and on one occasion, I’m told, tried to run down a man who was with one of them.”

“I’m very interested to know that, Stone,” the trooper said. “Would you say he was unbalanced enough to damage his own car and blame you?”

“I would. The NYPD suspects him of being the man who struck me with a car earlier this week, a hit-and-run that put me in the hospital and did this.” He held up the blue cast.

“I’m sorry to hear that, Stone. Are you feeling all right now?”

“Yes, except for this,” Stone said. He pulled back the robe to reveal his bruised leg.

“You’re lucky it wasn’t broken,” the trooper said. “I’m sorry to have disturbed you with this, Stone. You leave Mr. Daltry to me. He’s ordered a flatbed truck to take his car back to New York; I’ll see that he leaves with it.”

“Thank you, Harry. I’d appreciate that.”

“Does he know where your house is?”

“I don’t know, but it wouldn’t be awfully hard for him to find out.”

“You might just be on alert for the next couple of hours; it’ll take that long for the truck to pick him up.” The trooper gave him a little salute, got back into his car and left.

Stone went back into the house and found Celia in the kitchen, making breakfast.

“What was that all about?” she asked.

“That was our local constable, a state trooper. Someone damaged Daltry’s car at the Mayflower last night, and he blamed me.”

“Is everything all right?”

“Yes. I know the man. He’s seeing Daltry out of town.”

“He’ll come back,” she said.

“After breakfast, we’ll go back to New York. It would be too easy for him to find you.”

“All right.”

After breakfast Stone called the trooper and arranged to hire an off-duty officer to watch the house for the weekend; then they packed up and left for New York.

They were back on I-684 south when Stone pointed ahead of them. “Look,” he said. “That’s Daltry’s car on the flatbed; he’ll be in the truck.” He pulled her head into his lap. “Stay down until we’re out of sight.”

He caught a glimpse of Daltry sitting next to the truck driver as they passed. A glance in the rearview mirror detected no reaction from the man as they passed. He kept Celia’s head in his lap until they had exited the interstate onto the Saw Mill River Parkway.

They spent the remainder of their weekend cloistered in Stone’s house, cooking, massaging and making love.