Two Much!

57

The airline was very relieved when I decided not to be difficult after all. At first I made distraught references to overly steep and narrow spiral staircases, obvious safety hazard, I’d have my attorney look into previous damage suits, etc., etc., and generally I made as much noise and trouble as I could without making any real noise or any real trouble.

But the airline executives who flocked to San Juan and to my side like sparrows to a suet ball didn’t know any of the background. All they knew was that the 747 spiral staircase had been criticized by safety experts in the past, and that now they had a dead woman and distraught husband on their hands. A rich dead woman and a rich distraught husband. So they stroked my shoulders and they offered me sympathy and Jack Daniels and they spoke as emotionally as I did about this unfortunate and unforeseeable accident. (However, they did also mention from time to time that the autopsy would determine the alcohol level in Liz at the moment of her final flight; they did drop that fact in from time to time.)

In addition to compassion for my trouble and a mortician for my bride, the airline did at last also lay on a suite at the El San Juan, in which I was to rest and recover from my emotional ordeal. Once alone in a room dominated by sun plaques, I placed an immediate call to Leek, Conchell & McPoo, got through to Gordon Alworthy, the legal assistant who had sent out that package of trouble to begin with, and told him the situation in twenty-five words or less. “Elizabeth Kerner is dead,” I said. “I am Arthur Dodge, her heir and now controller of the Kerner interests. I want you on your way to San Juan by the next available plane, at Kerner expense, to handle the legal problems at this end.”

He grasped the situation at once, as I’d known he would, and made a penetrating and brilliant remark. “Yes, sir,” he said.