Katharine’s description of herself had, of course, been accurate. Her brief, gauzy yellow skirt was slit to reveal her long, tanned legs, and the matching yellow halter top left little to the imagination. Most of the platinum-blonde wig was hidden under the broad-brimmed black straw hat.
“This is your idea of incognito?” Mary Bliss asked, sitting opposite her at the table.
“I’m wearing dark glasses,” Katharine said.
“And very little else,” Mary Bliss pointed out.
Katharine poured her a margarita and shoved a basket of tortilla chips in Mary Bliss’s direction. “Do you want to lecture me, or shall we discuss the plan?”
Mary Bliss removed the bottle of Lomotil from her purse and took a hefty swig. She wiped her mouth with a napkin and eyed the margarita. “Is it safe to drink that? The water and all? You know how my stomach gets.”
“They have their own filtration system here at the hotel. Listen. We’ve got to get going here. You’re supposed to pick up your dive boat at ten A.M.”
Mary Bliss nibbled at a tortilla chip. “The desk clerk tells me my husband checked in early this afternoon. You know anything about that?”
“He works at one of the bars in town,” Katharine said. “Pablo and Paul’s. He’s American. Sort of an aging beach bum hippy type. Very cute. I gave him five bucks and a pair of sunglasses. He checked in as Parker. We met at the beach bar after I checked in. We’re supposed to meet again for a drink later this evening.”
“Will he be Parker tomorrow too?” Mary Bliss whispered.
“Of course,” Katharine said. “I told him we’re playing a trick on my husband. Poor thing. He’s adorable but totally clueless. I think it really is true about drugs frying your brain.”
Mary Bliss took a wary sip of margarita. “Can he drive the boat?”
“Absolutely. He grew up in Florida. Although, you’ll have to drive it after you drop him off down the beach. That’s not a problem, right?”
“I guess not. I’ve driven your boat up at the lake tons of times.”
“Right,” Katharine said. “You’re a great little pilot.”
“What about the death certificate? That’s the part that’s really got me worried.”
“Dinky knows some people. That’s the advantage of being an aging doper. You have all kinds of low-life contacts.”
“Who’s Dinky?”
“The bartender. Parker’s stand-in. Pay attention here, Mary Bliss.”
“I am paying attention,” Mary Bliss said hotly. “You never told me his name was Dinky.”
“Well, it is. Dinky Davis. And listen, that Discovery Channel stuff is bullshit. Dinky says it’s not all that easy to buy a death certificate.”
“What?” Mary Bliss exclaimed.
“Calm down. He says it’s not easy…but it’s not impossible either. He knows a guy who knows a guy. We have to meet him at eleven o’clock.”
“Tonight?” Mary Bliss sagged down into the chair. “God. I’m wiped out. You have no idea of the kind of day I’ve had. All that running around and packing. Making up a lie about a doctor’s appointment so I could get out of work. And then, that cop friend of Parker’s showed up at the house, just as I was leaving. I had to sneak out the garage door. And he still ran me down, stopped me in the driveway.”
“What cop friend? You didn’t mention any cops,” Katharine said, her voice rising.
“Not a real cop,” Mary Bliss said quickly. “He’s a retired GBI agent. Now he’s director of security for Southern Utilities. He keeps coming around, looking for Parker. Turns out they were doubles partners.”
“How much does he know?”
“Just that I was going away for the weekend. He saw the plane ticket sitting on the front seat of my car,” Mary Bliss admits. “Don’t worry about it. He just wanted to know whether Parker would be back in town in time to play in some tennis tournament.”
“I don’t like it,” Katharine said darkly.
“I don’t love it my own self,” Mary Bliss admitted. “But he’s harmless. I’m sure of it.” She wished she felt surer.
“What’s he look like? Is he cute?”
“Cute? Don’t ask me a question like that. You know I don’t look at men that way. He’s older. Probably around fifty. That kind of blonde hair gone silver, like Robert Redford. Athletic-looking. He had a beard the first time he showed up, but today he’d shaved.”
“See? You do look at men that way. You just won’t admit it. Christ, Mary Bliss, loosen up, will you?”
Mary Bliss took a long drink of margarita. She fixed a steady gaze on her friend. “I’m down here in a strange country, faking my husband’s death, buying phony death certificates, going on a boat ride with some scuzzball you picked up in a beach bar. That’s about as loose as it gets with me, Katharine.”
“So far,” Katharine said, giving her a broad wink.
A giant neon green cactus sprouted out of the squat cement block building that was Pablo and Paul’s. Crowds of writhing drunken people spilled out onto the sidewalk in front of the nightclub and the street, their screams of hilarity barely audible above the bass thump of rock-and-roll music pouring from the roof-mounted speakers.
“Wait,” Mary Bliss said, grabbing the door of the cab she’d just gotten out of. “Take me back to the hotel. I’m not going in there.”
Katharine grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her away from the cab. “You’re going,” she said sternly.
The cab sped away and Mary Bliss tucked her purse tightly under her elbow and clamped it to her side. “We’ll be mauled in that crowd,” she wailed. “Look at them,” she said, pointing at a cluster of teenaged boys who were casually demonstrating precision peeing on the side of the building. “It looks like spring break in Panama City.”
“I know,” Katharine said, grinning and adjusting her blonde wig. “All that youthful exuberance. Isn’t it divine? Just keep your head down and follow me.”
She bulldozed through the throng of partyers, with Mary Bliss’s hand attached to the waistband of her skirt.
Inside it was even more crowded. Maybe a thousand people were jammed into the warehouse-sized room, seated at long tables, milling around the horseshoe-shaped bar and dancing on the elevated glass dance floor to what Mary Bliss recognized as an old Bee Gees tune. The ceilings were festooned with dozens of gaily-colored piñatas, sombreros, more neon cactuses, and neon Dos Equis signs.
“Oh, good,” Katharine said, wedging herself closer to the bar. “There’s Dinky.”
“Where?”
“Right there,” Katharine pointed. “With the ponytail.”
Mary Bliss looked. She saw a short red-faced guy dressed in a Hawaiian shirt. He wore wire-rimmed glasses and was nearly bald on top with a long, stringy gray rattail curving over his shoulder. He held the clear plastic hose of a drink pourer high over his head and seemed to be shooting liquor into the gaping mouth of a middle-aged woman in a lime-green tank top whose arms were being held by three of her female friends.
“Good Lord,” Mary Bliss said. “That’s your idea of cute?”
“Work with me here,” Katharine said. “He speaks English and he doesn’t ask a lot of questions. And he comes cheap.”
“You said the magic word,” Mary Bliss agreed.
“There’s a table over there, against the wall,” Katharine said, pointing again. “You go stake it out. I’ll let Dinky know we’re here. And when the waiter comes, get me another margarita. No salt.”
Mary Bliss winced at the idea of margaritas. The white wine and her earlier margarita had given her a bad buzz, although she had to admit they had also helped settle her nerves a little.
By the time Katharine made it back from the bar, her margarita was on the table and Mary Bliss was sipping from a tall bottle of lukewarm Coke Classic that had cost six dollars, three times the price of Katharine’s drink.
“The guy should be here any minute,” Katharine said, glancing at her watch. “His name is Estefan.”
“How much should I tell him?” Mary Bliss asked.
“Nothing,” Katharine said. “According to Dinky, he’ll bring a blank death certificate. It’ll be all signed and notarized, with the spaces for name and time and date and cause of death left blank.”
“That’s it? And Dinky says it’ll look authentic?”
“It’ll be authentic,” Katharine assured her. “The guy works in the office of the medical examiner here in Cozumel. It’s totally legit-looking.”
“And I just hand him three hundred dollars? In cash?”
Katharine lowered her voice. “There’s a little more to it than that. The cost is actually eighteen hundred dollars.”
“Eighteen hundred!” Mary Bliss was outraged. “I don’t have that kind of money.”
“Shhh!” Katharine shushed her, although they could barely hear themselves above the Bee Gees’ greatest hits blaring from all sides. “That’s for everything. Including Dinky’s cut. I told you that Discovery Channel thing was bogus. Anyway, don’t go getting your knickers in a twist about the money. Thanks to the Diner’s Club cash advances, I’ve got that part covered. Now listen. You give him four hundred up front. He’ll show you the death certificate, as a gesture of good faith. Tomorrow, after the uh, accident, you’ll come back to the hotel, report Parker missing, ask the hotel people to call the police.”
“Then what?”
“Then the police will come. They’ll ask you some questions, you’ll tell them your story—sobbing hysterically, of course. They’ll make a brief search of the waters around the hotel and come back empty-handed. The investigating officer will walk you back to your room. He’ll be very sympathetic. You’ll be very generous.”
“How generous?” Mary Bliss’s eyes narrowed.
“Four hundred. And try to be discreet, for Pete’s sake.”
“Jezebel?” A middle-aged, hatchet-faced Mexican man stood at the table, his hand lightly touching Katharine’s bare shoulder.
“Estefan?” Katharine looked up, flashing her best winning smile.
“Jezebel?” Mary Bliss repeated.
Katharine shot her a warning look.
“Estefan, sit right down,” Katharine said, gesturing toward an empty chair. “Can we get you something to drink?”
“No, but thank you,” Estefan said. His English was perfect and unaccented.
“This is Lolita,” Katharine said.
Mary Bliss’s left eye twitched slightly. “How do you do?” she managed to say. She wasn’t sure how this type of transaction was handled. She’d never gone shopping for a death certificate before.
Estefan nodded politely. “Be assured that you have my condolences.”
He pulled a smudged white envelope from the inside pocket of the threadbare sport coat he wore and slid it across the table to her.
Mary Bliss covered it with her hand and looked back at him for guidance.
“Take a look,” he said softly.
“Right here? What if somebody sees?”
“Don’t worry,” he said, waving his hand in a gesture of dismissal. “People will just assume you’re buying drugs.”
She opened the envelope and glanced inside. The document had elaborate gold borders, scrollwork, a lot of Spanish writing, and an official-looking embossed stamp at the bottom. It could have been a death certificate, but then again, it could have been Estefan’s marriage license—she wouldn’t know the difference.
Mary Bliss pushed it across the table. Katharine gave it a quick look and nodded at Mary Bliss, who took an envelope of cash from her pocketbook and passed it under the table to Estefan. He snatched it out of her hand without the blink of an eye.
“It looks fine,” Katharine said. “And you’ll fill in all the blanks with the information we give you, right? And see that we get it back before we leave Sunday?”
“Sunday? No, Jezebel. That’s impossible.”
Mary Bliss started to say something, but Katharine kicked her under the table. “Sunday, yes. Dinky told you that. Lolita and I have to leave Sunday. And we can’t go without the death certificate.”
“But it’s Sunday,” Estefan said. “I am a very religious man. And this Sunday is the feast day of my wife’s patron saint. We have to make a pilgrimage many miles from here. I won’t be back until Monday at the earliest.”
Mary Bliss opened her mouth and Katharine kicked her so hard she nearly fell out of the chair.
“Estefan,” Katharine said coldly. “Just how religious are you, exactly?”
He thought about that. “Well. Perhaps I could persuade my sister-in-law to accompany my wife on the pilgrimage. But she would need some new clothing for the celebration. In fact, my wife was complaining this morning that she had nothing to wear for her feast day celebration.”
Katharine reached into her purse and magically produced a wad of greenbacks. “They have some very nice stores here in Cozumel, I see.”
“Oh yes,” Estefan said. “And my wife and her sister love pretty clothes.”
“I’ll bet,” Katharine said. The money went under the table and Estefan cheered up immediately.
“It’s settled, then,” he said, standing up. He gave each of the women a small, courtly bow. “The name of the police officer you will see tomorrow is Jorge. He is very helpful. Very knowledgeable.”
Estefan’s fingertips trailed across Katharine’s shoulders in a tender caress. “Until Sunday.”
“Sunday,” Katharine said, brushing his hand away. “And Estefan? Only half the cash is in that envelope. You’ll get the rest when you bring us the completed death certificate.”
He nodded, turned, and melted into the crowd.
Mary Bliss shoved her chair back from the table and began rubbing her bruised shins.
“Jezebel? Lolita?”
“What? You think Mary Bliss sounds more plausible?”