Delicious! (36 page)

Chic as usual, Joan-Mary entered my office, unfurling an aqua scarf from her neck. “What are you doing here on Saturday?” Even now, her breathy voice surprised me.

“I took the day off from my other job,” I improvised quickly, “so I could come in to catch up. Taking the afternoon off the other day put me behind.”

“How conscientious!” Joan-Mary came closer to the desk, regarding me with curiosity. “You had your hair cut. It’s wonderful. Who did it?”

“I went to a place called Eva.”

“On Bond Street? I’ve heard of her. She’s very good.”

“Thanks. Have you heard about the oven?”

“Yes.” She grimaced. “And wouldn’t you know it’s the only one in the city? I’m told it’s historically significant.”

“That’s great!”

“Oh, yes, just fabulous.”

“Thought I heard your voice.” Mitch strolled into my office, looking rumpled and adorable.

“You’re here too?” she said. “Doesn’t anyone believe in weekends anymore?”

To my relief, Mitch ignored her remark. “Forget about the oven. I’ve found something far more interesting.”

“When did you have time to find something interesting? Are you spending your nights here now?”

“I had a hunch and came over early to check it out.”

“Wonderful.” She raised her eyebrows. “What have you found? A secret room, perhaps, hidden behind a panel?”

“How’d you know?”

Her eyes flew to his face, startled. “I was kidding.”

He gave her one of his mischievous smiles. “I’m not.”

“Where?” Her face now combined fascination and irritation. The left side of her brain was busily spinning a plan to work this to her advantage, while her right brain was thrilling to the notion of a secret room.

“Behind a false wall at the back of the library.” Mitch didn’t try to hide his excitement. “I’m pretty sure the mansion was a stop on the Underground Railroad. But here’s the interesting thing: The secret room’s not a later addition. It’s original; members of the Timbers family were abolitionists. They designed the library specifically for that purpose; that’s why it’s so oddly situated.”

“Oh, dear.” Joan-Mary sat down abruptly; the right brain was losing. “I wasn’t expecting this. I suppose you have to call the Landmarks folks?” Her eyes were pleading, but when he nodded, she accepted reality. “Will you hold off until I talk to Mr. Pickwick? I want to walk him through this, make him understand the implications.”

“No problem. It is, after all, the weekend.” He handed her a sheet of
paper. “I’ve made a list of recommendations. And there’s a preliminary appraisal too.”

She stood up, all business now, folding the papers into her purse and pulling out her phone. She began to punch in numbers. “Do nothing till you hear from me. I’m going to try to tell him in person.” She walked out, and as her voice disappeared down the hall, we could hear her asking Young Arthur if he could see her in the next half hour.

“She didn’t even ask to see the secret room!” Her lack of curiosity shocked me.

“She’s in crisis mode.” Mitch shrugged into his jacket. “Trying to save the sale. I should go as well.” Suddenly he too was all business. “I left your folders on the first table in the library. You can’t miss them.” His tone didn’t change, but now his eyes caught mine. “We still have that rain check?”

“Not tonight. Sammy and I have to copy the letters. We can’t do it with all these people running in and out, and I don’t think we can risk putting it off. We’ll have to do it tonight.”

He studied me for a moment, and I knew he was trying to decide whether this was my attempt to put some distance between us. Then he reached out very deliberately and put his hand on my arm. We both could feel the jolt of electricity that passed between us. “Does this frighten you? I certainly didn’t expect it, and it scares me too. But those are the things that always turn out to be worth doing. So I’m not about to let this go. I wish I could cook for you tomorrow, but I promised to go visit my parents in New Jersey. So we’ll have to wait till Monday.”

“You’re cooking?” I asked, trying to lighten the mood. I wondered if he’d read me right, seen something I wasn’t prepared to admit, even to myself. It would be so much easier to end it here, before it had a chance to hurt. If I was honest, the thought of a relationship filled me with terror.

“I’m a good cook. You’ll see. Come right after work. I’ll text you the address; it’s not far from Fontanari’s.” He didn’t linger over the kiss and left quickly—afraid, I thought, to give me time to change my mind.

—

I HAD SO MUCH TO DO
. I should call Sammy. But for the longest time I did nothing, just sat at my desk, thinking about last night, wondering about the future. I think I might have dreamed the entire day away if I had not been interrupted by the sound of footsteps in the hall. Pulling myself together, I went to investigate. To my surprise, I found Young Arthur.

I hadn’t seen him since the day he’d closed the magazine, and he obviously didn’t recognize me. He made a strange little startled motion, and I realized that he had not, of course, expected to find anyone working on a weekend. “I’m Billie Breslin,” I said quickly, “the one who’s here for the
Delicious!
Guarantee.”

“Oh, yes,” he said absently. “I’d forgotten.” It occurred to me that he might not even know that it was Saturday. “You’ve heard about our hidden assets?” He was wearing some kind of cologne that made the back of my throat prickle.

I nodded. “Pretty exciting.”

“Some might consider it so.” He walked into my office and stood looking speculatively around him, and when he spoke it was more to himself than to me. “But from my perspective, it makes things rather complicated. The realtor tells me a fast sale is almost impossible now; nobody wants to be burdened with a lot of red tape. I thought I’d just come see this bit of history for myself.”

Young Arthur ambled into Jake’s old office, peering around as if he’d never seen it before. He sat down briefly on the big four-poster and gave a little bounce, like a kid testing a mattress. He got up and ran his finger across the long crack on the mantel, and I remembered what Mitch had said. Then he went over to the window and gazed down at the garden, where the forsythia was now a riot of yellow. Abruptly, he turned and walked out. I thought he’d forgotten I was there. I could hear him climb ponderously up the stairs, hear him move into the library. He didn’t linger; five minutes later, when I heard his descending footsteps, I finally punched Sammy’s number into my phone.

—

MY MIND WANDERED
as I read him the last letter, the night coming back to me in staccato flashes, a tumble of remembered sensations. Mitch’s arms around me, his voice in my ear, and the way our bodies fit together.

“Read it once more.”

I jerked back to the present, focusing on the words this time. Lulu, I thought, had acquired a mature generosity she hadn’t had before. “ ‘Wherever he is, I hope that he is happy,’ ” I repeated. “Do you think she really believes that he’s alive?”

But Sammy had heard something else. “He took her to Le Pavillon!” His voice was dreamy and very far away. “I always longed to go there.”

“Was it famous?”

On the other end of the phone, there was a tiny hiss of horror. “Famous?” His voice broke. “My dear, it was much more than that: It was important. It was perhaps the premier restaurant of the last century. In 1939, the French government dispatched Henri Soulé to New York with orders to establish a restaurant on the grounds of the World’s Fair. They offered him carte blanche; his only mission was to demonstrate the superiority of true French cuisine. Soulé marshaled a band of superb chefs, conveyed them to New York, and created an enormous sensation. His success was so complete that the government sent them back the subsequent summer. Then disaster struck: The war started while they were on this continent. Stuck in New York, the entire crew launched an establishment of their own. Imagine how Lulu must have felt, walking into the most celebrated restaurant in the universe.”

“She didn’t seem overwhelmed.”

“Soulé obviously looked upon her with approbation. He was famous for that; he scrutinized each customer, singling out favored patrons as ‘members of the club.’ His criteria were inscrutable; he never elucidated how he knew whom to lionize. It had nothing to do with either fame or fortune; it was just what he called ‘a feeling.’ ”

Le Pavillon was Sammy’s kind of place.

“Lulu obviously found favor with the great man; what would I not give to learn how her life turned out.”

“Well, we do know some things. We know that Mother and Mr. Jones got together.”

“Predictable.” He was dismissive. “I anticipated that some time ago. Is it fair to conjecture that Lulu married Tommy?”

“I doubt it. People don’t usually end up with their high school boyfriends.”

“You may be right.” Sammy’s voice sharpened. “May I ask where you found the letter?”

I told him. “What an ignoramus I am!” he cried. “We have been speculating about the Underground Railroad for months.”

“Mitch figured it out too,” I said, telling how he’d come barging in.

“How terrifying! You must have been petrified—alone in Anzio under enemy attack.”

“It wasn’t fun!”

“Are you quite certain of that?” There was a knowing tone in his voice.

I felt a little glow of happiness. This time it wasn’t the memory of Mitch: It was the fact that Sammy knew me so well.

Well enough to ask no further questions. “We had best scan the letters with alacrity. Shall I come now?”

“I don’t think we’d better risk it. The stagers are coming back today. Maybe Young Arthur too. And I have no idea when Joan-Mary might decide to return to take a look at Anzio and the oven.”

“Given the hullabaloo surrounding the mansion, it would be unwise to risk a daytime foray. Shall we make it a late-night mission?”

“Great minds think alike.”

“Excellent.” His voice became brisk. “Shall we say ten
P.M
., at the mansion?”

“Aren’t we being formal.”

“My dear girl, would you have it any other way?”

“
O
NE THIRTY-SIX A.M.” SAMMY LAID THE COPY OF LULU’S LAST
letter carefully into the box. It just fit. “Have you received another message?”

“He must have gone to bed.” Mitch had been texting little messages all night, informing me of the unspeakable things he was doing to Amy.

“I like your young man.” Sammy closed the two boxes we had filled and began gathering up the folders. “Let us return the originals to their proper place.”

We carried the folders back to Anzio, pushing them onto the shelves. When we were done, we stood in the doorway, taking in our surroundings. The tiny room stared back at us, bland and silent, its single bulb hanging motionless. Sammy sighed. “We will probably never see this again.” I took out my phone and snapped a picture, trying to memorize the dense, almost physical feeling of quiet and the pleasantly musty smell. Sammy reached for my hand. “We have been happy here,” he said simply.

Outside, it had begun to drizzle, and we hailed a taxi, the cab shooting through rain-slicked streets. We slid along watery reds and greens, the changing lights captured in the canvas of wet tar. It was very still, the sidewalks empty, with only the occasional cab nosing south. “New York seems such an oasis in the middle of the night.” Sammy had his face pressed against the window. “For this moment, we alone possess the city.”

The doorman came out, umbrella raised, to help unload the boxes. I started to climb back into the cab, but Sammy stopped me. “Stay.” He handed the driver a fistful of bills. “Please? Solitude is not my preference. Not tonight.”

I was relieved. I didn’t want to be alone either, and I trailed Sammy through his elegant lobby, thinking gratefully of silk pillows and velvet quilts. I had no idea what tomorrow would bring, but for tonight I was grateful to find shelter here.

SAMMY MADE ME BREAKFAST
the next morning; while I ate, he called Anne to suggest she contact Young Arthur first thing Monday morning. “If you inform him of the valuable letters secreted in the library and offer to catalog them, gratis, you may be able to rescue them from a terrible fate.” They were still strategizing when I left. I went home, grateful I’d told Sal and Rosalie that I wouldn’t be in. So much had happened during the last week, and the day stretched before me, blissfully empty.

“You sound happy.” Dad always called on Sunday. “Did something happen?”

“Not really.” Was it that obvious? “It’s just spring. The weather’s been beautiful. Everybody in the city’s happy.” I wasn’t ready to talk about any of the past few days’ events. Not yet. I got on the subway and rode all the way out to Flushing, losing myself in a neighborhood so foreign I might have been in Hong Kong or Seoul. I wandered for hours, going in and out of exotic malls. When I got home I took a long hot shower, ordered a major Ming feast, washed it down with half a bottle of wine, and went to bed early.

In the morning I looked longingly at the chiffon dress, wishing I hadn’t been wearing it the other night; it made me feel so good. But I didn’t want Mitch to think I wore it every day, so I pulled on the orange leggings, the short red skirt, and the T-shirt that looked like mother-of-pearl. I glanced in the mirror—did I look okay?—and then treated myself to a cab. I was feeling oddly fragile, worrying about what the day
would bring, nervous about tonight’s dinner with Mitch. Sure enough, just as the cab pulled up to the mansion, my phone began to ring and I saw that it was Mitch’s number. Was he calling to cancel?

“Have a nice time at your parents’?” I asked.

“I can’t tell you how much I’d rather have been with you. But that’s not why I’m calling. I’m calling to admit that you were right to blow me off and copy your letters the other night. Pickwick apparently spent yesterday camped out at the Timbers Mansion, and now he’s decided not to sell. He’s on his way over, as we speak, with his personal decorator.”

“How do you know?”

“He asked me to meet them there. Joan-Mary suggested that my services might be useful.”