Mrs. Pollifax on the China Station

Pollifax’s bed and gave her a radiant
smile. ”Let’s make it a toast, shall we?” and clicking her glass against Mrs.
Pollifax’s she said lightly, ”Shall we drink to Peter?”
    Mrs. Pollifax stared at her. ”To—Peter?” she said, wetting her lips.
    ”To Peter,” Iris said, and tipped her glass back and emptied it. Leaning
over Mrs. Pollifax she pulled back the blankets, pounded both pillows, got up,
and stirred the two cups of tea, tasted one, made a face and picked them up,
leaving Mrs. Pollifax somewhat alarmed and very alert now.
    ”Peter is dead,” Mrs. Pollifax told her carefully. ”So is Forbes. They
hope to find Peter’s body tomorrow.”
    ”Oh?” said Iris briskly. ”They say the currents in that river are very
treacherous, though.”
    ”Yes.”
    Iris was digging out Mrs. Pollifax’s pajamas from her suitcase. She said
in the same brisk, conversational voice, ”The thing is, you know, I once did
some undercover work in Texas ...
I was dancing in this place where they were selling drugs and porno under the
table, so to speak, except I didn’t know about that until I got approached by
the law.”
    ”How very interesting,” said Mrs. Pollifax, watching her.
    ”Isn’t it?” Her voice was oddly soothing as it continued without
expression, simply stating facts as casually as if she were describing the
weather. ”I worked for the law for about eight months and I wasn’t any heroine,
believe me—and by the way, I’ve just checked your room here for bugs, so nobody
else is hearing this—but it was all of it great training for somebody who’d
breezed through life never noticing anything. I watched, snooped a bit where I
wasn’t supposed to, eavesdropped, reported to the undercover guys, and the
place got closed up. Besides earning me a citation it left me marked, though.
It taught me to notice things. Little things.”
    ”Oh?” said Mrs. Pollifax cautiously.
    ”Yeah,” said Iris cheerfully. ”Little things, like a certain young man
in our tour group who doesn’t speak any Chinese but then one day he stands next
to Mr. Li and Mr. Kan while they’re telling jokes—or telling something funny, obviously— and this young man has to turn his face away to hide his own
laugh because obviously he understood every word they were saying.”
    ”How—amazing,” said Mrs. Pollifax weakly.
    ”I certainly thought so. And then his doing so much yawning and napping
after we got here to Urumchi, as if he never got any sleep at night... not to
mention the two of you going over the wall together after we got to Turf an. I
saw that, and saw somebody follow you, too, because you all passed my window,
one by one. I was standing there in the dark doing my isometrics, and I think I
can guess now who it was who followed you both.” She grinned at Mrs. Pollifax.
”You’re a wonderful actress, no one would ever guess that you’re not—but never
mind.”
    Mrs. Pollifax looked at Iris thoughtfully. ”You’re a remarkable actress
yourself, Iris, and now I can thank you for what you did in Turfan. Above all
I’m glad to understand why you did it because—”
    Iris nodded and handed her the codeine tablet. ”I know—it worried you.
And believe me, I don’t want to know anything more and I’m not fishing,
honest.” She held up her right hand to emphasize this, as if she were under
oath. ”Except I’ve got my own theories and I just want to make sure of one
thing: we’ve been drinking a toast to Peter, right? To maybe long life and
double happiness for him?”
    Mrs. Pollifax smiled at her warmly. ”Iris, I love you,” she said, ”and I
thank you because finally I think I’ll be able to cry now. To Peter, yes. ” She emptied her glass of brandy, feeling it reach down to her toes, and then
she leaned over and hugged Iris and allowed her to tuck her into bed.

Chapter Fifteen
     
    T he next morning, after a
sleep filled with nightmares— all of them about Peter—Mrs. Pollifax discovered
that she could neither tie her shoes nor comb her hair with her arm in a cast.
Only she, Iris, and the two guides were well enough to appear at eight o’clock
in the dining room, the others being still sick in their rooms, and after Mr.
Li had tied her shoes for her—surely an act of contrition she thought, looking
down at his sleek black head—and after Iris had brushed her hair for her she
was borne off to visit security headquarters again, this time in the gray limousine
with the cigarette hole