faCade at this. She knew she was responsible for poor John’s injury.
I started writing out a statement while Tom showed Ferdinanda and Yolanda the dining room, where they would be sleeping, and the little bathroom off the kitchen. Once they were bustling around in there, Tom poked his head back in the living room and said he was going to make some calls, to see if he could palm some of the puppies off on people we knew.
Without warning, Yolanda appeared beside him. “Palm them off forever?” she whispered.
“Yolanda,” said Tom gently, “you find a new place to live, you can take a couple back. How’s that?”
Yolanda, whose lovely face was creased with fatigue and fragments of cinders, nodded but did not move. I finished writing on Boyd’s pad—this time, I added the whole bit about finding the marijuana plants—and then handed it back to him. Boyd scanned it and said if he had any more questions, he would call me.
“Thank you,” I said weakly.
“You need me to go out and buy anything for you?” Boyd’s dark eyes moved from Yolanda to me.
“Puppy chow,” I said meekly. “That’s what we need.”
“No problem. One of the grocery stores is open late.”
I said, “Thanks.”
Boyd muttered something about it being no problem again, rubbed his scalp once more, and said he would be back in twenty minutes.
Yolanda and Ferdinanda were still in the bathroom. I wondered if they had been able to pack any clean clothes into the stuff they’d brought or if they needed me to launder things for them. Well, I supposed they would tell me. Ferdinanda was not someone who kept her needs and opinions to herself.
“Success!” said Tom when I came out to the kitchen. “I called Father Pete first, because he’d be upset if we didn’t. He’s coming over tomorrow afternoon and taking three dogs. Marla’s taking three, and she’s going to call her cleaning lady, Penny Woolworth, who will probably be over tomorrow morning, early, before she starts work. According to Marla, Penny’s been saying she wants a dog, since Penny’s husband, Zeke, is now in prison for stealing cars. Knowing Marla, she probably has more information on Zeke and Penny than I ever did. Oh, and Marla’s coming for dinner, too. I thought the least I could do was invite her to stay. I told her our meal could be a memorial to Ernest, whom she knew, apparently.”
I said, “Goodness. I’ll set us up, then hunt for a bottle of wine to go with the ham.”
“No need for the latter. Marla’s bringing us, and I quote, ‘a couple of bottles of the good stuff.’ She said, and I quote, ‘If Ernie had still been drinking, that’s what he would have wanted me to do.’ ”
“ ‘Ernie’? ‘The good stuff’?”
Tom shrugged. Since Marla’s idea of good wine began at a hundred bucks a bottle, I just shook my head and started setting the table. Boyd returned almost soundlessly, a bag of puppy chow in hand. He and Tom worked on settling the little dogs in our pet containment area with food and water. With Yolanda and Ferdinanda still in their bathroom getting cleaned up and changed, Tom and Boyd trundled off to set up cots in the dining room and make them up with clean sheets. They made a path through the furniture to the bathroom, wide enough for the wheelchair. Tom hung a clothesline across the opening between the living room and the dining room and slung a sheet over it, for privacy. Yolanda and Ferdinanda were set, for now at least.
I showed Boyd out, thanking him profusely as we walked down the hall. He merely nodded.
Fifteen minutes later, the doorbell rang and Marla swept in. She was clothed in full autumn regalia: orange and brown leopard-print St. John’s jacket, russet pants, pumpkin-colored silk scarf, and tobacco-hued Italian leather loafers. She’d had her hair colored so that it appeared bronzed. It was pulled back from her face with clusters of citrine-crusted barrettes that matched dangling citrine earrings. Her face was merry, and she held up a canvas bag that clinked with wine bottles. The effect was dazzling.
“I’m so sorry to hear about Ernie,” she said.
“We all are.”
“He was killed?”
“Yes,” I said quietly.
She leaned forward. “Can you talk about it?” she whispered.
“Not yet. Sorry. Tom may be able to tell you more.” When I hugged her, there was the sound of glass clinking. “Careful of the wine, Goldy,” she said. “I brought a bottle of Dom, plus two of Bordeaux. You shake the Dom, and it’ll explode all over the place.” I let go of her and offered to take her jacket. “Not yet,” she said, “I need to stay warm. The temperature’s dropping fast. Plus, you wouldn’t believe the mess I had to come through on the way over here. I about froze to death in the Mercedes while waiting for a fireman to wave me through. They’ve got half the roads going into Aspen Hills blocked off with water trucks, apparently. It looks as if some asshole started another forest fire, which you wouldn’t think would burn when it’s raining, but—” She stopped talking when she saw my face. “Oops. Are
Before I could answer, Yolanda emerged from the kitchen. “Marla!” she cried. “I am so glad to see you, you have no idea.”
Marla gave me a questioning glance. I said, “Yolanda and her great-aunt, Ferdinanda, are staying with us for a few days. They were staying with Ernest McLeod, and it was his house that burned down . . . while we were inside. We got out, thank God.”
Marla shook her head and quirked her eyebrows at Yolanda. “You were living with Ernie? The last time I talked to you, out at the spa, you were living with Kris Nielsen.”
Yolanda’s face darkened. “We’ll bring you up to date over dinner. Come meet my aunt Ferdinanda.”
“You call her your aunt, and not your great-aunt?” asked Marla. No detail was too small to be caught by Marla’s antennae.
“I call her my aunt,” said Yolanda. “It makes things easier.”
We moved into the kitchen. Tom relieved Marla of her sack of bottles, then shook his head when he took the first one out. Tom knew his wine values, and Marla’s generosity, even if it did come from inherited money, always amazed him. I put out five crystal glasses while he put a towel over the stopper in the Dom and began the gentle job of twisting it out. Before he could finish, his cell beeped urgently.
Tom put down the bottle and towel and went into the living room to take the call. I twisted the stopper in the Dom until it popped out in my hand, followed by a small gush of bubbly. So someone had done some expensive shaking. I carefully placed the bottle in a champagne bucket, then stuck crushed ice around the edges.
Yolanda and I scooped the food into serving dishes while Marla gave Ferdinanda her usual third degree: When had she come to this country, why were she and Yolanda together, how did she end up in a wheelchair? As usual, it went over the border line between showing interest and being nosy, but Ferdinanda was happy to be the center of attention.
Tom returned. His eyes were hooded, and he gave no indication of what the call was about. He poured the champagne and handed each of us a glass.
“To Ernest,” he said. We lifted our stems and drank.
6
After we’d prayed, Tom busied himself slicing the ham. I passed around the applesauce, the Caprese salad, and—yum—the homemade macaroni and cheese. A crust of cheddar had browned over the creamy lake of pasta, and I took a bite that was both crunchy and soft. When my eyes widened in amazement, Tom smiled. The ham, which Tom had glazed with brown sugar and Dijon mustard, was meltingly tender, and the chunky cinnamon applesauce set it off perfectly. The meal was a wonderful way to remember Ernest.
Marla stopped eating momentarily, took a sip of wine, and turned her attention to Yolanda. “So, when did you and Kris break up?”
“That
Taken aback, Marla cleared her throat and touched one of her jeweled barrettes.
I said, “Ernest invited Yolanda and Ferdinanda to stay at his place.” I omitted the part about the rental burning down, knowing that would bring another torrent of questions. “Yolanda was fixing his dinners—”
When Marla waved her fingers to interrupt me, all her gems glittered in the kitchen light. “After the Jerk and I got divorced? And Ernie and Faye did the same thing? Ernie and I used to drink together at the Grizzly. Then he got
