Creature Discomforts

supplied. “Obviously,” Effie countered, “Norman was no friend of environmentalism, but he wasn’t about to sell out to you and Wally while he was alive, was he?” Before Wally or Opal could respond to the veiled accusation, Effie unveiled it. “Quint and I have discussed the matter at length. We cannot believe that Norman climbed up Dorr just because he felt like it. We think he was deliberately led up there.”
    “Not led,” Quint corrected. “Lured.”
    “Thank you,” his wife commented. “Lured. And we do not think that on his own he would’ve gone anywhere he was likely to fall. And the question we keep coming back to is, Qui bono?”
    “For Christ’s sake,” my father bellowed, “speak English!”
    Rowdy’s and Kimi’s ears went up: Does he mean us ? “You wait and see,” Effie warned. “With Norman Axelrod dead, Wally and Opal are going to find some way to get their dirty hands on his property. They’ll murder every living thing on it, just the way they got their hands on Norman Axelrod!”
    Wally was now sweating with rage. “That,” he shouted at her, “is libel!”
    “Isn’t it slander?” Gabrielle asked innocently. “I always have a hard time remembering which is which.”
    “If something is true, ” Effie informed her, “then it isn’t either one. So what Quint and f would like to know,” she said, turning to face Wally and Opal, “is just exactly where the two of you were when Norman Axelrod supposedly fell.”
    “This is absurd,” said Gabrielle, the peacemaker. “Effie, we have known...”
    “Anita!” Wally demanded. “Anita, Opal and I have just been libeled...” He broke off. “Slandered. Which is it?”
    “Slandered.” Anita looked disheveled and hot. A scratch on her right hand was oozing blood. She raised the hand to her mouth and, with odd sensuousness, licked the wound. “If it’s spoken, it’s slander.”
    “Well, in that case,” Wally said vehemently, “Opal and I are suing for slander. This woman, Effie O’Brian, has just damaged our reputation in the presence of witnesses. Not only in the presence of ordinary witnesses! In the presence of our attorney! Anita, aren’t you an officer of the court? Well, you heard her! And we are suing!”
    As if to underscore the power of the threat, Wally bent to retrieve a crowbar that lay at his feet, ft occurred to me that if Buck was, in fact, carrying a handgun, at least he wasn’t the only armed person in the group. A hatchet rested near Malcolm Fairley’s feet, and Steve held a pair of loppers heavier than Opal’s. Lightweight pruning shears dangled from Anita Fairley’s left hand. Now she tightened her grip on them, transferred them to her injured right hand, and ran her left hand idly through her lovely blond hair.
    Malcolm, her father, was staring at her. He had the kind of solid-looking New England face and Yankee jaw that seem designed by Nature and trained by Nurture to reveal almost no emotion. The only visible change was in the color of his weathered skin: The tan drained away, leaving him white and haggard. Then red splotches surfaced on his cheeks. Facing his daughter, he asked quietly, “Anita, can this statement be true?”
    “Am I an officer of the court?” she replied. She was expressionless.
    “Wally,” said Malcolm, his voice cold with shock, “has referred to the presence of his attorney.” He waited. Anita said nothing. “You,” Malcolm told her, “are the only attorney present.”
    “My practice is my own business.” Anita’s face was sullen. Impatiently, she brushed invisible dirt or dog hair off her pants. “There’s such a thing as client confidentiality, you know.”
    “My daughter, ” Malcolm said incredulously, “is representing developers?” It was almost as if a mist had magically appeared to surround him as he spoke words of private horror to himself. “Property developers? Here on this island? My daughter? The Pine Tree Foundation’s attorney? Impossible.”
    Opal glared at her husband. She spoke softly, but her voice quivered. “Wally, how could you be so stupid!” With what struck me as genuine obliviousness to Malcolm Fairley’s shock at the revelation of Anita’s betrayal, Wally ignored his wife. He directed himself to Malcolm. “Let’s get something straight here. No one has done anything in the least bit fishy. Swan and Swan is the most environmentally responsible corporation in the state of Maine, and—”
    “Hah!” Effie