is the past.”
Joan’s face looked better than when he saw her Saturday morning. There was good color in her skin and her eyes were clear. So far, she had not lit a cigarette, which was unusual for her. She was wearing no makeup at all. It was also obvious her hair had received little attention in the previous four days.
“It really was good of you to seek me out,” Joan said. “Have I been much trouble?”
“I was worried about you. I’ve been stood up for dinner before, often, but seldom for breakfast.”
“Not very nice of me.”
“It’s okay. I had breakfast anyway.”
“Well.” She looked into her coffee cup.
“The food here is very good.”
“Isn’t it? I love it.”
“Very good indeed. You wash dishes in this establishment?”
“Yes.”
“Didn’t think you knew how.”
“It’s not one of the more artful skills.” She showed him her hands. “Aren’t they beautiful?” They were red and wrinkled.
“They look honest.”
She fluttered her hands and put them in her lap. “I feel like a schoolgirl who’s been caught playing hookey.”
“It’s just nice to know you’re alive.”
“Any questions I might have had about you and Alan’s death …” She looked into Fletch’s face, then at the scar on his neck, then into her own lap. “… I don’t have now. The money—”
“I’m willing to do my best to try to explain.”
In truth, Fletch wondered if Joan, in her extreme competence, was making some sort of a bargain with him.
“Not necessary,” she said. “I know as much as I want to know. I pursued you to Brazil out of some sense of duty.” Numbly, she repeated, “Some sense of duty.”
He pushed his empty plate away. He realized Joan Collins Stanwyk was expected to wash it.
He sat silently, gazing out to sea. He waited until she understood that he was not questioning her.
She was sitting on her bench, her back straight, leaning on nothing. “I walked away from you that morning, Saturday morning, away from your hotel, to walk to my own hotel. You had said some things I had never heard before. I became angry in a way I had never been angry before.
“Suddenly I realized that here I was, a grown woman, stumbling along in the morning sunlight in tears because someone had stolen my little pins. My pinky rings! Little plastic cards with my name on them!”
Fletch said, “Also irreplaceable photographs of your husband, Alan, and your daughter, Julie.”
“Yes. That profoundly bothers me. But I realized what a spoiled brat I was. I am. Skinny little beggar children were dancing all around me as I walked along, their hands out, whispering at me. I waved my arm at them, and through tight jaws shouted,
“I became truly angry at myself. What a superficial, supercilious bitch. What a hollow person. I had spent the night whining at the poor assistant manager at the hotel. I rushed to you at first light, to whine to you. And here I was virtually swinging at hungry kids.”
She said, “Joanie Collins had lost a few pins.”
Fletch sipped his coffee.
“Then I had a second thought, based on what you had said.” Her index finger was feeling along a short crack in the table. “In a most peculiar way, I was free. I had been relieved of my identity. My credit cards had been stolen, my passport. It almost meant nothing that I was Joan Collins Stanwyk. At least, I couldn’t prove it immediately to anybody. I couldn’t go up to anybody, in a store or something, and say, ‘I’m Joan Collins Stanwyk,’ and make it mean anything. As you said, I was just arms and legs: one more person walking naked in the world.
“I liked that thought. Suddenly I liked the idea of being without all that baggage.”
From behind the serving apparatus, a tall, slim man was peering out at them. He was looking from Joan to Fletch to Joan again with apparent concern.
Fletch said, “You’re still Joan Collins Stanwyk.”
“Oh, I know. But, for the first time in my life, it didn’t seem to mean much. I saw that it didn’t have to mean much.”
Again Fletch permitted his question to remain tacit.
“When I got to The Hotel Jangada, a tour bus was waiting. I didn’t know where it was going. I joined the people, the women in their short silk dresses, the men in their plaid shorts, and got on it. No one asked me for a ticket, or money. Obviously I belonged to a group from The Hotel Jangada. I belonged with these people. I stole a bus ride here.”
Fletch smiled. “Thievery is infectious.”
“The bus stopped here for lunch. I didn’t have lunch. I couldn’t pay for it. What a new fact! What a new feeling! I wandered around the beach. I let the bus leave without me.
“I wondered who I was. Really was. Really am. I wondered if I could survive a full day without cash, without credit cards, without my identity. I wondered what life would be like, for just a few moments, if I couldn’t pull something out of my purse and say, ‘Here I am, now do as I ask, please; give me …’” She smiled at herself. “It was getting dark. So I came here and had dinner. I sat over there.” She indicated a bench near the door. “I felt as guilty as hell.” She put her elbows on the table in a most unrefined way, her chin on her hands. “Then I went and washed dishes for them.”
“Is it fun for you?”
“It’s harder than tennis. I daydream about having a proper massage. God, last night I wanted a martini so badly.” She shrugged. “I can’t understand a word of the language. It’s so soft, so sibilant.”
The tall man, wiping his hands on an apron, finally was approaching them.
Joan’s face was happy. She said, “This noon, a well-dressed couple arrived for lunch. German, I think. In a Mercedes, behind a uniformed driver. I found myself looking at her over my pile of dirty dishes. Somehow it made me angry that she only picked at her lunch. Of course I understood. She has to keep her figure….”
The man stood behind Joan, looking at Fletch. He put his hand on her shoulder.
She put her hand on his.
“Fletch, this is Claudio.”
“
Fletch half rose, and they shook hands.
“Claudio owns this place, I think,” Joan said. “At least he acts as if he owns the place. He acts as if he owns the world. It may just be Brazilian masculinity.”
Assured she was all right, and apparently without conversation in English, Claudio left the back of his hand against Joan’s cheek for a moment, then went back to the kitchen.
“Are you here forever?” Fletch asked. “Have you decided upon dish-washing as a career?”
“Oh, no. Of course not. I love Julie. I love my father. I must get back. I have responsibilities. To Collins Aviation. I’m the best fund-raiser Symphony has.”
Fletch put the brown paper sack on the table.
“Just leave me here for a while,” Joan said quietly. “Let me play truant from life for a short while, from being mother, daughter, from being Joan Collins Stanwyk. Leave me be.”
“Sure.” He pushed the paper bag across the table at her.
“What’s that?” she asked.
“The money I was bringing you Saturday—enhanced by poker earnings. For when you decide to get back.” She looked into the bag. “Surely enough to get you back to Rio, pay a hotel bill for a few nights, pay for Telexes.”
“How very nice.”
