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“SO WHERE WERE WE?” Emma asked. Detective Medeiros and his silent sidekick had left. Emma, Pat, and I had reseated ourselves at my kitchen counter.
“We were getting career advice from Pat.”
Emma got up, went to my refrigerator, and poured herself half a glass of vodka.
“Emma, it’s not even noon.”
“I’m making myself a Bloody Mary. What? It’s a respectable breakfast drink.”
“I don’t have any Bloody Mary mix.”
“How about tomato juice? You got tomato juice?”
“Why on earth would I have tomato juice? Anyway, Melanie made me get rid of everything with tomatoes in it.”
“Orange juice, then?
“Sorry.”
“Oh well.” Emma sat back down next to Pat and brandished her glass at him. “Wanna sip?”
Pat shook his head. “No thanks. Enjoy.”
Emma did exactly that. I certainly wouldn’t have been able to consume undiluted alcohol as quickly as Emma was doing and remain coherent, but Emma had a lot of muscle mass. As short as she was, she outweighed me by a good margin, and could crush me at arm-wrestling.
“Molly,” Pat asked, “do you remember what happened yesterday? Right before Melanie jumped? If it’s not too soon for you to talk about it.”
“It’s not too soon. I’m fine.” I closed my eyes and tried to recreate the scene. “Let’s see. Melanie had her laptop and her phone out. I thought she was being kind of rude. Anyway, she said she had to use the bathroom and she put down her tea and handed me her . . . laptop!”
“What about her laptop?” Pat asked.
“I still have Melanie’s laptop. I need to call Detective Medeiros and—”
“Wait,” Pat interrupted. “You have Melanie’s laptop? Go get it. We need to see what’s on it.”
“Break into her computer? Won’t they be able to tell if someone’s been poking around?”
“It’s not against the law to look at her computer,” Pat said. “And you have to protect yourself, just in case anyone decides to sue you or something. Make a backup of the files. Then you can give it to the police.”
“That’s a great idea.” Emma dealt Pat an extra-hearty back-slap. She had already made significant headway on her tomato-less Bloody Mary.
“I don’t think we’re supposed to look at someone’s private information without their permission. Isn’t that against the law or something?”
“She’s dead. So it’s moot.”
“Emma, you’re not a lawyer.”
“We don’t have to tell anyone,” Pat said. “Who’s gonna know?”
“Two against one,” Emma declared.
“Fine. But if I get in trouble for this, you guys are taking the blame.”
We started up Melanie’s laptop, watched the logo blink on and off as it booted, and then stared at the blank password box on the login screen.
“Any ideas?” Pat asked.
“Let me try something.” I typed in phallusinwonderland. It worked.
“What was that?” Emma asked.
“Our old band. ‘Phallus in Wonderland’. The name was Melanie’s idea.”
“The punk band you guys were in?” Pat asked.
“The same. It was so long ago. Wow. It’s like Melanie peaked in grad school. That’s kind of sad.”
“What’s this file from yesterday? ‘Flower Club’?” Emma reached in front of me and clicked to open the file.
“Those must be the notes she was taking. Flower Club? Come on Melanie, it’s the Garden Society, not the Flower Club.”
“You’re being a little harsh, Molly,” Pat said. “She is dead.”
“She never could be bothered to pay attention if something didn’t immediately interest her. Peoples’ names. MLA format. Deadlines.”
“Fontanelle Masterson is the hostess,” Emma read. “Very old. Too hot and sticky here. Tea is warm. Boring lecture about stems. Molly seems entertained. Doesn’t take much. Better than sitting around her house with no air conditioning.”
“Hemingway-esque,” Pat said.
“It is not Hemingway-esque,” I protested. “Our hostess’s name was Fontanne Masterman, not Fontanelle Masterson. A fontanel is the soft spot on a baby’s head. Sheesh.”
“Let’s back up the files first,” Pat said. “Then we can read all we want.”
I found a disused drive, and copied Melanie’s documents to it.
“Perfect timing,” I said. “Her battery’s almost dead, and I have no idea where the charger is. Now should I call Detective Medeiros and tell him to come back and get the laptop?”
“I’ll drop it off down at the station. I was going to go down there anyway. I still have some loose ends to tie up on a story I’m working on.”
“Great. All yours.” I handed Pat the laptop and made a show of dusting off my hands. “Glad to be done with this.”
“Not so fast,” Emma interjected. “I still need another paddler on my crew to replace Melanie. Then we’re done. Molly, alls you gotta do is sign the forms and pay the dues, and show up tomorrow morning for practice.”
“No.”
“Oh, come on Molly. It doesn’t hafta be—”
“No.”
“Shoot.” Emma folded her arms. “Maybe I’ll try call Sherry Di Napoli. I bet she misses paddling. I could probably talk her into coming back to Hawai`i.”
“Are you serious?”
“This is getting interesting,” Pat remarked.
“You’re still in touch with Sherry?” I asked.
“You got something against Sherry?”
“Of course not.”
It was true. I got along with Sherry Di Napoli, despite her being one of those people who seemed to attract trouble. What made things awkward for me was Sherry happened to be Donnie Gonsalves’ ex-wife. To make matters worse, there was apparently enough of a physical resemblance between the two of us that people would comment on it. (Except, they’d invariably add, Sherry was much thinner.)
Of course I trusted Donnie. And I knew there was nothing deader than a dead romance.
Still.
“You don’t have to call Sherry,” I said. “I’ll do it.”
“You’ll do it?” Emma made a convincing show of surprise.
“Yes. I’ll paddle with you guys.”
“Right on. I knew you’d come around. I have some old board shorts you can use, and you can even wear my jersey from last year’s Labor Day Race. Don’t look like that, Molly. You’re gonna love it.”