Free Death in the Polka Dot Shoes by Marlin Fitzwater Page B

remarkable aspect of her ensemble, that starched blouse. It seemed like her one great effort at conformity in the world, an anchor perhaps against totally slipping into the abyss of her reclusive life. Although she wasn’t a recluse, in the sense of hiding or staying home. Indeed, she often waved energetically at passing motorists, to the point you wondered if she knew you, or recognized your car, or perhaps needed help. I stopped once, but she kept on walking, and the dogs never even looked my way. There was something otherworldly about all three of them, detached from our life by their own self sufficiency. Perhaps that’s why they didn’t have personal names, just the pipe lady, the lab and the mutt.
    â€œNed, this is all quite fascinating,” Diane said, “but I can’t handle any more mammy yokums today. I better head home. I’ll draw up a simple retainer contract and get it to you tomorrow. Also, there’s a public meeting on the new resort next week. You better plan to go.”
    â€œDiane,” I said, “you’re a peach. If I get too far into this place, I’m counting on you to pull me out. Drag me back to the Willard and pour scotch down me until I come to my senses.”
    â€œMr. Neddrick Shannon, Esquire, I will do that,” and she kissed me on the cheek.

Chapter Five
    When the public relations man for Chesapeake Resorts International said his new hotel would bring better highways and streets, a twelve-foot slide flashed on the screen showing a spaghetti pattern of Los Angeles freeways at rush hour. Some young business school graduate no doubt put these slides together, thinking the string of cars inching along six lanes of traffic would be a wonderful backdrop to the words. But to the citizens of Parkers, gathered in the local elementary school to hear the future of their town, it was explosive.
    Six hundred people gasped. Air gushed from the gymnasium. And then as one body, as if practiced in some philharmonic hall, every farmer, waterman and wife in the place screamed “NO-O-O-O.” And it didn’t stop for long minutes. People stomped on the wooden bleachers in the gym. One lady screamed, “My God. My God.”
    â€œMy God,” I said, turning to my brother’s wife, “what are the briefers doing? They can’t be this stupid.”
    â€œDoes CRI think we want more cars and roads?” Martha gasped. “They’re crazy.”
    The briefer was turning whiter than the free throw line below his table. He just sat with his four colleagues and said nothing. After several minutes, the audience settled, and he tried to make a joke.
    â€œI guess we took a wrong turn back there,” he said sheepishly.
    â€œNo Shit!” someone screamed. And then the crowd roared again. The briefers could do nothing but wait until everyone settled down, and hope to start again.
    Martha got a babysitter for Mindy so she could accompany me to the first public briefing by the Chesapeake Resorts International, my newest client, concerning their hotel and shopping complex to be built on Jenkins Creek. I invited Martha because my brother had also worked for CRI, but I never heard exactly what he did for them. Maybe Martha could tell me, plus I remembered she had mentioned meeting the corporate brass at some reception. I also thought it would be nice to give her a night out, even if it was work related. That’s how I assuage my guilt in these matters.
    We arrived at the Parkers Elementary School about seven, and cars already filled half the parking lot. The bleachers in the gym pull out from the walls and one side will hold about 500 people. When we walked in, the corporate public relations people were setting up a slide screen and arranging their papers on the folding table in the middle of home court. I didn’t introduce myself, even though I had met most of them the day before in Washington. Rather I wanted to stay in the background, sit