HardScape (31 page)

Connie and I gave an orphans' Thanksgiving. We invited Ed Hawley, and Alison and Mrs. Mealy, and my mother, and Vicky McLachlan, and Rita.

The morning was bitter cold. I put the top down for the Fiat's last ride till spring and froze my hair off. By ten o'clock we were back in the garage, oil drained, battery disconnected, and a cover ready to pull on when the engine cooled.

Connie had insisted on cooking the turkey, so I hustled across the street to give her a hand. I'd been popping in and out all week. Last night we'd set the table and arranged the flowers. As soon as everything was good-to-go, I drove out to Frenchtown and picked up my mother, and we called on Renny's mother. When we got to Connie's, Vicky had arrived with a lovesick Tim in tow. Ours, she confided, was one of four politically necessary Thanksgiving dinners they'd be dropping by.

Alison and her mother slipped in almost unnoticed and tried to hide in the kitchen. Poor Janet Mealy was absolutely overwhelmed by Connie's mansion, while Alison had already informed me that her new braces, which she swore hurt like Klingon torture, made her smile look like the front of my Oldsmobile. Connie chased them into the drawing room. There, sitting with a simple elegance in a Salvation Army thrift-shop suit, was Ed Hawley, who addressed Janet as “Ma'am” throughout the afternoon.

Rita Long arrived late, flushed from the cold, as beautiful and exotic as a Russian princess. She presented Connie with an enormous basket of glacÃ©ed fruits. Connie thanked her courteously, even as her back stiffened at the extravagance.

At the table, however, she warmed to Rita, admiring how the young woman drew Mrs. Mealy, Alison, and Ed into the conversation. Twice Connie cast me unusually approving glances, and once I caught her nodding subtly at my mother, who didn't quite get it. Rita charmed her too, of course, coaxing her into a gardening discussion and even writing down the Latin names for perennials my mother touted.

Rita was the last to leave after dinner. At the door, she said, “Will you take me house-hunting tomorrow?”

“For real?”

“I've decided to stay, but not in that house.”

“Do you know what you want?”

“Something nice and cozy.”

I'd believe that when I saw it. She was a very wealthy widow, sole heir to Long Technical Systems, which had a good chance of surviving Jack's death thanks to Ron's canny father and some managerial people I'd recommended. I promised if she came by in the morning I would show her a few places.

***

I had prepared a list of “cozy,” and we spent Friday morning going from one cramped cottage to another, had lunch at the Drover, and visited some bigger places in the afternoon. I was about to invite her home for a drink when she said, “Show me the Richardson place again.”

“I don't want to go out there.”

“He was my husband, he wasn't yours. Nobody you loved died out there.”

“
I
almost died out there.”

She returned her warmest smile and asked, “Did it ever occur to you you don't
want
to sell the Richardson place?”

“No.”

“Then show it to me.”

“You're the customer.”

I headed out Route 7, fast, because the days were getting very short and we'd lose the light by four-thirty. Rita was sitting with her head back on the seat, hair shimmering like black lacquer, debating the pros and cons of the houses we'd seen.

“I like your house,” she said suddenly.

“Not for sale. Besides, you wouldn't want to live on Main Street. You can't run around naked with the shades up.”

“But at least you don't get raccoons making videos.”

“Sometimes they come in the house. Slip down the chimney.”

Ahead, a quarter mile, someone had parked a hay wagon on the shoulder. I got a little warning tingle in my scalp and hit the brakes.

“What?” she cried, thrown against the seatbelt.

“Speed trap.”

We eased by Ollie at forty-four.

I waved. One finger.