Death of a Sweep - M. C. Beaton [73]
He shook his head sadly. At least there was always work to take his mind off her.
By dint of thieving passports, Sandra Prosser had made her way to Jensen Beach in Florida. She rented a small flat in a condominium full of old people. After a week, she was bored. The money would not last forever. She did not have the courage to try to open a bank account and get money transferred from the Cayman Islands and also because she had a shrewd suspicion that her husband would have cleared out that account. She hired a car and drove down into the pretty town of Stuart, looking at the shops, and wondering for the first time if it would not be easier to just give herself up.
She missed her husband. She had not cried when she had learned of his death, but now she remembered the good times they had enjoyed, the expensive trips abroad, and the generous allowance he had given her.
Sandra went into a bar, sat up on a bar stool, and ordered a vodka and tonic. ‘How much?’ she asked the barman.
‘The gentleman over there wishes to pay for it.’
Sandra swung round. A man dressed in expensively casual clothes raised his glass to her. Sandra picked up her own glass and went to join him.
‘I’m Vic Faziola,’ he said. ‘You’re new here, aren’t you?’
‘Visiting for a bit,’ said Sandra. He was about her own age with thick brown hair greying at the temples. He had a sallow face and small black eyes. ‘What does one do around here?’
‘People go swimming or surfing. I own this tavern so it keeps me busy. You English?’
‘Yes.’
‘What brings you to Florida?’
‘Just a holiday. I thought some sun would be nice.’
‘Why don’t you meet me here at eight this evening and I’ll take you for dinner. I like getting to know the visitors.’
Sandra went back to her flat, feeling happy. It was nice to know she still had pulling power. But the afternoon stretched out ahead. She decided to go swimming and then find a hairdresser.
She put her swimsuit on under a blouse and jeans, stuffed underwear into a bag, drove back to Stuart, and headed for the beach.
Great glassy waves curled on to the beach. The sun beat down. It was very hot. Sandra had left her wallet and the bag with the dwindling money in her flat.
She left her clothes on the beach and plunged into the water. She was a powerful swimmer. With steady strokes, she headed out to sea and then turned on her back and floated, dreaming that her new companion would turn out to be her escape from looming poverty.
A log floated past and scraped her arm. Sandra cursed and decided to head for shore. She turned on her front. As she raised her head, she saw the figure of a lifeguard shouting something through a loud-hailer, but the wind had risen and she could not hear what he was saying. Probably a storm coming. She raised her head again. Now he was running towards the water, pointing frantically.
Maybe a boat was coming up on her. She twisted her head around and that’s when she saw it – a dorsal fin cutting through the waves in her direction. Sandra began to swim as hard as she could. But she was too late.
Great teeth plunged into her leg. She let out a scream of pure terror. Then she disappeared under the waves and a red stain spread out over the blue water.
It took a long time to recover the bits of Sandra from the sea and put them together with a woman who was missing from the condominium. Her flat was searched and several stolen passports recovered. It was unclear how she had managed to pass through passport controls at airports, where she would get fingerprint and retina scrutiny. But Sandra had driven to Mexico, picking out-of-the-way border controls, and once she was in Mexico had bribed a trucker to take her across the border into the States.
From fingerprints found in her flat, Interpol identified her at last as the missing Sandra Prosser.
Hamish Macbeth had to read about it in the newspapers, angry that neither Jimmy nor anyone at Strathbane had taken the trouble to tell him.