Page 52 - Labelle Gramercy, Detective

Road Kill

organize a memorial service. Yes, it sounds lame, but nobody here
will be sober enough to notice.”
We went inside. Once again, Lon Durer was the first to greet us.
He was still several sheets to the wind, but his eyes immediately
snapped into focus when we took him aside and told him about the
‘accident.’
“What? You mean she went out of here and got killed in the road?
Jeez, I hope nobody blames me for giving her a drink. I mean, I
didn’t actually give her anything. Everybody just takes what they
want, until the old frigo is cleaned out. I can drive with a few beers
under my belt, but maybe a girl on a bike would have trouble, I don’t
know.”
Labelle put on a show of sympathy—not very convincingly to me,
but I was predisposed to perceive her behavior as completely
motivated by the inquiry. “You knew her well, didn’t you?” she said
to the inebriated man. Fortunately he did not meet her gaze; she
could not or would not veil its intensity.
“Oh, not really. Frank used to bring her over here when she was
going with him. He might still be here. Hey, Frank!” He staggered
into and out of the bedrooms, like a pinball off a bumper.
“Who’s Frank?” I whispered to Labelle, then repeated loudly
enough to carry over the thumping disco music.
“Frank Bean, assistant Peace Corps director. He broke up with
Sally a few weeks ago. Not very pleasantly, I hear.”
It seemed odd—even unethical—to me that an older official in
the organization would be having an affair with a volunteer, but this
was a long way from home and the man might not be more than a
few years her senior. The Peace Corps was dependent on its veterans
for management material, often giving positions to ex-PCV’s with no
particular aptitude or qualifications for higher levels of responsibility,
but who had proven their adaptability to local conditions and had
expressed the desire to remain in them.
I turned to ask Labelle more about Bean and Furth, but she was
talking to another man slouched on a sofa, perhaps an acquaintance.
I waited where I was, not wanting to barge in. The music stopped,
and someone fumbled with a cassette player until it resumed. There
seemed to be fewer people in Durer’s house than when I first came
by; the place looked even more barren.

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