She has quietly informed the staff that the woman posing as Claire Underwood who is staying in suite 317 might very well be Shelly Carpenter. Lizbet has also told the staff not to overdo it. The last thing they want is for Claire/Maybe-Shelly to think her cover is blown and figure out she’s receiving special service. If that happens, she won’t write the review at all.
From the looks of things, Claire/Maybe-Shelly is having a wonderful time. She drinks the percolated coffee in the morning, takes an interest in Louie’s chess matches, raves about her yoga class with Yolanda, rides one of the free bikes into town to shop and get lunch at the Beet; she lounges by the adult pool, takes her tours and lessons, and heads out for her solo dinners stylishly dressed (Lizbet’s favorite look is white jeans, a sleeveless black bodysuit, and leopard-print wedges).
Late on Saturday afternoon, Claire/Maybe-Shelly stops by the front desk and says, “Where did you source those blue cashmere blankets? I’d like to get one to take home.”
“Nantucket Looms,” Lizbet says. She checks the time. “They’re closed now but they open tomorrow at ten.”
“Darn,” Claire/Maybe-Shelly says. “My flight leaves at ten.”
“Let me see what I can do,” Lizbet says. She goes to the second-floor housekeeping storage, where they keep half a dozen extra blue blankets. Lizbet wraps one up in hydrangea-blue tissue. Is she being too obvious, too heavy-handed? Will Claire/Maybe-Shelly see the blanket for what it is—a bribe?
Lizbet takes the risk and presents Claire/Maybe-Shelly with the blanket the next morning when she checks out. Claire/Maybe-Shelly seems genuinely overcome by the gesture—so thoughtful, thank you, her stay at the hotel has been an utter delight.
“I’m a pretty tough customer,” Claire/Maybe-Shelly says. “But I’ve never been as won over by a hotel stay as I have by this one.”
Yes! Lizbet thinks. Yes-yes-yes-yes-yes-yes!
After Claire/Maybe-Shelly walks out the front door, trailing her Away carry-on behind her, Lizbet wants to high-five her staff, but she exercises restraint. They can all celebrate on the last Friday of the month when the Hotel Nantucket becomes the only property to ever receive five keys. For now, Lizbet will remain…cautiously optimistic.
The next morning, Edie knocks on Lizbet’s office door. Claire Underwood is on the phone and has asked for Lizbet personally. Something’s up.
In the housekeeping office, Magda assigns Octavia and Neves the first-floor checkouts, but instead of sending Chad and Bibi to the second floor, she closes the office door.
“The two of you were responsible for the checkout of suite three seventeen yesterday, were you not?” Magda asks.
“We were,” Chad says. He was, frankly, amazed that Magda assigned him and Bibi, rather than Octavia and Neves, to the owner’s suite, but he took it as a vote of confidence. They’ve been doing good work—but yesterday, only Chad did good work. Bibi was in a foul mood, and when Chad asked her what was wrong, she said that her “baby-daddy,” some dude named Johnny Quarter, had left the state without a trace, and with him went the five-hundred-dollar-a-month child-support payments. She had her aunt report Johnny Quarter to domestic relations, who issued a summons.
“But doing that doesn’t get me my money,” Bibi said.
She spent most of the time in suite 317 working like a person underwater. The owner’s suite was bigger and grander than the other suites in the hotel. The Nantucket-night-sky mural was painted in finer detail; the library had brass rails and a sliding ladder to reach the upper shelves. There was a separate dressing room, and the second bedroom was an elegant study complete with a built-in desk; on the walls hung prints of the hotel in the early twentieth century. There were cream-and-blue Persian carpets instead of rainbow-hued Annie Selke rugs throughout, and the bathroom included a steam sauna. It was very extra.
“Why did they rent out this room?” Bibi asked. “The owner isn’t here.”
“I guess they thought Shelly Carpenter showed up,” Chad said.
“I have no idea who that is,” Bibi said.
“She has this Instagram account and blog called Hotel Confidential,” he said. “Don’t you follow her?”
“Why would I follow something called Hotel Confidential?” Bibi asked, and Chad thought, Because you work in a hotel? But he had to admit, he’d never heard of the Hotel Confidential blog. Chad checked it out and fell down the rabbit hole, scrolling through a bunch of Shelly’s past posts and clicking on her bio to read the reviews. Shelly Carpenter had been everywhere—to the Angama Mara safari camp in Kenya and the Malliouhana in Anguilla and Las Ventanas al Paraiso in Cabo—but she also reviewed more modest places, like motels on Route 66 and beach bungalows in Koh Samui, Thailand. The way she described these places was so detailed and precise that Chad felt like he’d been there too. It was exciting to think that she’d been to their hotel (maybe; no one could be sure). He wondered what she was going to write about the place.
“Well, it’s a thing, she’s internet-famous, and Lizbet offered her this suite as an upgrade.”
“Internet-famous?” Bibi said. She paused. “Why don’t you do the bathroom, Long Shot. I’ll finish the bed.”
Ms. English says, “The guest called to say she left behind a black suede Gucci belt. I went through the suite myself but didn’t find it.” Ms. English gives them both a death stare. “Did either of you see it?”
“I didn’t see a Gucci belt,” Bibi says. “Or any belt. Have you checked the laundry?”
“Yes, Barbara,” Ms. English says and both Chad and Bibi stiffen. Has Ms. English ever used Bibi’s real name before? No. They’re in trouble, Chad thinks. Bibi is in trouble. Bibi took the Gucci belt, of course—just like she lifted Mrs. Daley’s Fendi scarf. At some point when Chad was cleaning the bathroom of the owner’s suite, he noticed the door had been closed behind him. He heard the vacuum running and he’d nearly poked his head out to check on Bibi. The reason he hadn’t checked on Bibi, he admits to himself now, was that he hadn’t wanted to know if she was actually vacuuming or just using the noise as a cover. She was upset about money, the loss of five hundred dollars a month, the specter of having to pay a private investigator to track down the baby-daddy. The guest in the room, Claire/Maybe-Shelly, had left a sixty-dollar tip, and as always, Chad told Bibi to just take the whole thing, which she did with her usual attitude of entitlement even though half of it was rightfully his.
But apparently that hadn’t been enough. She had taken Claire/Maybe-Shelly’s Gucci belt.
“What did the belt look like?” Chad asks.
“Black suede with a rose-gold double-G buckle,” Ms. English says.
Bibi probably already has it up on eBay or Craigslist, Chad thinks. She’ll get six hundred bucks because those belts cost close to eight hundred. Chad knows this because his mother has a Gucci belt and it’s an egregious habit of hers to fake-complain about exactly how much her wardrobe costs.
“This is the second incident I’ve had with you two where something has gone missing.”
Bibi glowers at Ms. English, her eyes like two cold, clear marbles. “I bet you haven’t asked Octavia and Neves about it, have you?”
“They didn’t clean the room,” Ms. English says.
“But they have a master key!” Bibi says. “I’m telling you, they’re trying to frame me.”
This is the same outrageous claim Bibi made last time; it feels like a little kid pointing a finger at the playground. But her face shines with such indignant anger that Chad entertains that possibility for a second. Octavia and Neves seem like nice girls, but what if they are plotting to get Bibi fired?
Because he fears that’s exactly how this is going to end.