WHEN I AWOKE THE next morning, the ship was still and land was visible out the window. We had docked in Kusadasi. The light on my phone was blinking. There were two messages. John rang to say that he hadn’t been able to connect with Jorge on the Golden Goddess, but not to worry. That ship was at sea today and he was sure to reach him eventually. Carleen phoned as well, inviting me to join her, Pops, and a few others on a private tour of the ancient city of Ephesus. Dare I leave the ship? I wondered. I wasn’t sure, so I decided to get dressed and see what was what.
Pops was just coming out of the bathroom. “Holly, would you mind giving me a touch-up?” He handed me his black Magic Marker and sat on the edge of my bed.
“What time did you get home?” I asked, streaking his white-gray hair with touches of black.
“A few minutes ago,” he said. “Carleen invited me to spend the night and we had quite a time.” He did the Groucho Marx eyebrow thing.
“Carleen? Are you kidding me?” I said, shaking the Magic Marker at him.
“Hey, be careful with that,” Pops said.
“No, you be careful. You’re an unemployed cabdriver. She’s Carleen frickin’ kazillionaire. You’re reaching for the moon.”
“Nope,” he said with a wink. “The moon’s reaching for me.”
“Puh-leeze.” I rolled my eyes. “And what about Lucille? You’ve been spending time with her too. What if she finds out you’ve been courting Carleen? She could get upset.”
“We’re on vacation. Do you know how long it’s been since a woman, any woman, found me attractive? But with these fancy clothes, and on this ship, I’m a babe magnet. Let me enjoy the fantasy before I go back to my doggie pillows at Muttropolis, okay?”
“All right, but please don’t get Lucille or Carleen mad at you,” I warned. “Between them and Denis, someone has to write a million-dollar check to the museum. That’s our ticket out of the doghouse.” I filled him in on the missing trunk, how I had inadvertently been carrying original costumes and not copies, how I was in a hundred times more trouble than I thought, and how we needed the donation now more than ever.
Pops was shocked and appalled at the news and promised to be on his best behavior. “We’re leaving at ten,” he said, checking his watch. “Meet us at the bottom of the gangplank if you’re coming.”
I ate breakfast alone in the main dining room—scrambled eggs, hash browns, bacon, coffee. I was on red alert for any unusual activity, namely police on board, but everything felt normal. John was calling the Golden Goddess in search of my trunk. There was nothing more I could do, so I decided to chance the outing.
There were twenty or more gray vans waiting for passengers in the parking lot, all headed to Ephesus and Sirince, where the Virgin Mary was said to have lived out her final days. We, on the other hand, would be ferried in a white stretch Hummer with a driver and private tour guide, the ultra-elite in a sea of the merely privileged, thanks to our host and perpetual cruiser, Carleen Panthollow.
As soon as I arrived, we took off. Pops, Carleen, Lucille, Denis, Annie, and Sydney (who was absentmindedly pumping her pink weights and staring out the window), were on board. In the searing sunlight, the limo was hot and stifling.
Carleen fanned herself with her hand. “Can we get some air in here? I’m sweating like a whore in church on Sunday.”
As a bead of sweat trickled down my temple, I was relieved by the whir of the air conditioner. “You have nice definition in your arm muscles,” I said to Sydney.
“Yes, thank you, it’s true,” she said.
Good answer, I thought, noting it for future use in my own bag of quips. “So where’s Manny?”
“At the pool,” said Denis, as he tapped out an e-mail with his BlackBerry.
“Where I should be,” Annie declared.
“You got that right,” Sydney mumbled.
“I heard that,” Annie whined. “Dad, did you hear what she said?”
“Annie, I’m just saying that there’s more to life than swimming all day in a cruise ship pool.”
“Like what?” Annie said. “Learning about culture?”
“No,” Sydney said, “like swimming at the Hotel du Cap. Now they have a pool worth spending the day by.”
“Well, I’m not there now and I won’t be until Christmas, will I?” Annie said.
“Not a moment too soon,” Sydney muttered.
“Da-ad,” Annie whined.
“C’mon, you two,” Denis said. “Can we declare peace just for today?”
“What about your mom?” I asked Sydney. “They didn’t want to come?”
“Aston’s indigestion was acting up,” she said. “He wanted to take it easy.”
“With the food on this ship, I’m not surprised,” Pops said, patting the blubber pad that protected his Olympian abs.
“Where’s the captain?” Denis asked. “You two seemed awfully chummy last night.”
I was surprised that he had noticed, and pleased too. “Oh, we’re just friends,” I said. “I’m sure he’s busy doing ship things.”
“The two of you left the bar awfully suddenly,” he pressed. “First you were there, then you were gone.”
“I was trying to escape the karaoke hostess,” I kidded.
Our tour guide cleared her throat to get everyone’s attention and began talking about the lovely landscape of the countryside as we glided along the mountainous terrain toward our first stop. I couldn’t imagine a more perfect day to make this drive. Never had I seen a sky so blue (except in allergy pill ads, and those are Photoshopped). Our guide told us about Ephesus, which is one of the best-preserved ancient cities of the Mediterranean, having been founded in the tenth century BC. It was second only to Pompeii as a preserved Roman civilization tourists can visit today. Until this trip, I’d never heard of the place.
We arrived at the upper gate, the highest point, where the religious and state ruins were located. The sun was sizzling and there wasn’t even a sliver of a breeze. Our guide explained that
