“Feels the same,” said Maria. “The important question is why Rebecca won’t tell us where she disappeared to last night. And why she’s grinning so much.”
“I just had a dream, that’s all.”
“What kind of dream?”
“A Brad Pitt dream. We’ll leave it at that.”
The BBB left the sleeper and entered the dining car. The people having breakfast turned around and applauded.
“You were great last night,” said a woman in a sun hat.
“They didn’t tell us more cast members would be hidden among the passengers,” said her husband. “What a performance!”
“What are you talking about?” said Teresa.
“I got it all on video if you want to see.”
“We do,” said Sam.
They crowded around. The man adjusted the tiny crystal screen on his camcorder and played back Preston’s hypnosis show. Sam quacking, Paige scraping her shoe and so on. The BBB began to boil as they watched. But it was nothing compared to Maria’s reaction when she saw herself with the blow-up doll.
“I’ll kill the son of a bitch! Who’s got a gun?”
Passengers took more notes.
Suddenly, yelling and a struggle at the front of the car.
Dee Dee had demanded an apology about eating from her hat, and Preston had told her to go fuck herself with one of her precious bananas. Andy and Spider had to separate them. Passengers scribbled furiously.
“Preston, enough’s enough!” said Frankie. “Sometimes it’s just not funny anymore. Like back in Bridgeport when that mob chased us out of
More writing in notebooks.
The book club marched angrily up the aisle, ready to read Preston the riot act. A woman in a red dress pushed by them and stormed to the front of the car.
“Preston?”
He turned around. “Yes?”
“You don’t remember me, do you?” said the woman.
Preston squinted at her face. “Should I?”
“Albuquerque.”
“Let’s see… Albuquerque, Albuquerque… oh,
“Betty.”
“I was just about to say Betty.”
“I finally tracked you down, you worm! How dare you take advantage of me like that!”
“Take advantage of you how?”
“Hypnotizing me to think you were Brad Pitt so I’d have sex with you!”
“You!” said the woman, pulling a gun from her purse and pointing it at Preston.
Some passengers ran out of space and had to break out new notebooks.
“Hold on a second! I can explain! I, I was trying to help you…”
“Help me! How was that helping me?”
“You obviously have a problem with men…”
Mistake.
Just before she pulled the trigger, Spider grabbed her arm, and the bullet flew out an open window. Andy and Frankie helped wrestle the woman to the ground, kicking and screaming.
Preston looked around with a fake grin. “Those blanks sure sound real!”
They got the gun away and hog-tied the woman with Andy’s belt and waited to hand her over to authorities at the next stop.
The BBB looked at each other.
“Did she say ‘Brad Pitt’?” asked Rebecca.
“Yes, she did,” said Sam.
“Something’s not kosher in Denmark,” said Teresa.
“You used me!” the woman screamed from the floor. “You made it so every time I heard the word
Rebecca began jumping up and down. “Look, it’s Brad Pitt!”
“The trigger word is probably a toggle,” Sam told Teresa. She grabbed the shrieking Rebecca by the arm.
Rebecca stopped jumping up and down. “Why are you holding my arm, Sam?”
“I think we need to have a talk.”
The women stood in the aisle explaining things to Rebecca. Rebecca’s head shook side to side. The other women nodded. Rebecca shook her head harder. The others nodded sadly.
Rebecca broke from the group and ran to the front of the car. “Wait!” yelled Teresa.
Too late. “Did you have sex with me last night while I was under hypnosis? I’ll kill you if you did!”
One passenger leaned to another. “That Preston’s finished.”
The second passenger nodded, still writing. “Too many enemies, plenty of motive. Now it’s just a matter of creating the opportunity for murder.”
The train slowed at the next depot. Only a few little patches of snow left. The Savannah police boarded and carried off the woman in the red dress, still kicking and screaming. “I’ll kill you, you bastard! I’ll cut your fucking dick off if it’s the last thing I do!”
A passenger turned to a fresh page in her notebook. “This is the best mystery train I’ve ever been on.”
36
The dining car began filling up again shortly after noon.
Waiters circulated, dropping off drinks, opening order pads. “Chef’s salad or Caesar?”
It was a sunny day on the train; warm light poured into the dining car through the glass skydome.
Serge was sitting with the book club. “Chef’s salad,” he told the waiter. “Extra dressing on the side. Double-chop the lettuce. That is all.” He still hadn’t seen any sign of Eugene Tibbs. Surely he hadn’t missed the train.
Paige pointed out the window. “Palm trees!”
