Ian was still chewing his lip. Georges said gently, “Ian, I urge you to accept Marjorie’s help. It is evident that she is expert.”
Ian stopped jittering. “Georges, take his feet.” The men carried the body into the big bath. I hurried ahead and dropped Dickey’s gun, cuffs, and wallet on the bed in my room, and Janet put his hat with these items. I hurried into the bath, undressing as I went. Our men, with burden, had just reached it. Ian said, as they put it down, “Marj, you don’t need to peel down. Georges and I will take it through. And dispose of it.”
“All right,” I agreed. “But let me take care of washing it. I know what needs to be done. I can do it better naked, then a quick shower afterwards.”
Ian looked puzzled, then said, “Oh, hell, let him stay dirty.”
“All right if you say so, but you aren’t going to want to use this pool or even go through it getting in and out of the Hole until the water has been changed and the pool basin itself scrubbed. I think it is faster to wash the body. Unless-” Janet had just come in. “Jan, you spoke of emptying this plunge into a holding tank. How long does that take? Full cycle, in and out.”
“About an hour. It’s a small pump.”
“Ian, I can get that body clean in ten minutes if you will strip it and stick it into the shower. How about his clothes? Do they go down your oubliette, whatever you call it, or do you have some way to destroy them? Do they have to go through the pool tunnel?”
Things moved fast then, with Ian being fully cooperative and all of them letting me lead. Jan stripped down, too, and insisted on helping me wash the corpse, while Georges put the clothes through their home laundry and Ian went through the water tunnel to make some preparations.
I did not want to let Janet help me because I have had mind control training and I was fairly sure that she had not. But, trained or not, she is tough. Aside from wrinkling her nose a couple of times she did not flinch. And of course, with her help, it went much faster.
Georges brought the clothes back, dripping. Janet put them into a plastic sack and pressed the air out. Ian reappeared up out of the pool, with the end of a rope. The men hitched it under the body’s armpits and shortly it was gone.
Twenty minutes later we were clean and dry, with no trace of Lieutenant Dickey left in the house. Janet had come into “my” room while I was transferring items from Dickey’s wallet into the plastic money belt she had given me-primarily money and two credit cards, American Express and Maple Leaf.
She didn’t make any silly remarks about “robbing the dead”-and
I would not have listened if she had. These days, operating without a valid credit card and/or cash is impossible. Jan left the room, came back quickly with twice as much cash as I had salvaged. I accepted it, saying, “You know that I have no notion as to how and when I can repay this.”
“Certainly I know it. Marj, I’m wealthy. My grandparents were;
I’ve never been anything else. Look, dear, a man pointed a gun at me . . . and you jumped him, with your bare hands. Can I repay that? Both of my husbands were present. . . but you were the one who tackled him.”
“Don’t feel that way about the men, Jan; they don’t have my training.”
“I could see that. Someday I would like to hear about it. Any chance you will go to Québec?”
“An excellent chance if Georges decides to leave.”
“I thought so.” She offered me more money. “I don’t keep Qfrancs in the house, much. But here is what I have.”
At that point the men came in. I glanced at my finger, then at the wall. “Forty-seven minutes since I killed him so he has been out of touch with his headquarters one hour, more or less. Georges, I am about to attempt to pilot that police APV; I have the key right here. Unless you are coming with me and will pilot. Are you coming? Or are you going to stay and wait for the next attempt to arrest you? Either way, I am leaving now.”