"Well - " I began.
Leah studied me with an up-and-down look. Recalling my work on last year's Soir‚e? No. She said flatly, "You're not looking to work as a model."
I blushed. "No, I'm helping Andre with the lunch - "
"Then please don't give any more models coffee! Then everybody wants some and everybody complains about unfairness and nothing gets accomplished. And you'd better move that food outside to the deck. Hanna and Ian are terrified the set will be covered with crumbs. By the way, people have already started eating those burritos. The break hasn't even been announced! Why did you put out the food?"
Andr‚'s face wrinkled with rage. "My spring rolls," he retorted loudly, "are not burritos, Miss Smythe. Goldy! Rescue my dish."
"I'm sorry, truly I am," I murmured to Leah. "I'll get it right now." Conflict with competitors is one thing. But the first rule of food service is that you avoid fights with clients.
In the great room, I snatched the spring rolls and slid them onto a tray. One was missing; one had been dug into. I scanned the cabin's interior for the culprits, squinting suspiciously at the scruffy man in overalls who'd moved Gerald Eliot's air compressor. Still engaged in set construction, the fellow was hanging a snakeskin on the wall between the Christmas tree and the far windows. Next to the skin, he'd hung a weapon I recognized: It was a Winchester, just like Tom's. Rattlesnakes and rifles. Now that's what I called the spirit of the holidays.
Leah quick-stepped to rejoin the judges. She, Hanna, and Ian peered dubiously at a sharp-faced blond woman wearing white pedal pushers and a halter top. The woman's extreme thinness, her bony hips, her distinct rib cage, contrasted bizarrely with her high, full breasts. The other auditioning models were nowhere in sight. Still, the smell of cigarette smoke told me they weren't far off.
Clutching the tray, I hustled back to the kitchen. Andr‚ was cleaning up his beaters and bowl. I grabbed a clean pair of tongs and removed the gutted spring roll. To my chagrin, the tongs snagged unexpectedly. I carefully pulled them up; between the tongs was the violated roll and a cilantro-tangled piece of... hair. With a silent curse and surreptitious haste, I opened the tongs over the trash. Then 1 quickly covered the dishes with foil and rewashed the tongs and my hands. I had never seen Andre make such an error of hygiene. My doubts about his ability to shift from retirement to catering went from sea-level to subterranean.
I scooped up the covered dishes, slipped into the foyer, and stepped briskly past the dozen young people who'd suddenly reappeared. Rustine held the front door of the cabin open for me.
"The blonde's had her breasts enlarged. Plus she's wearing flesh-colored falsies," she whispered.
"I beg your pardon?" I whispered back, startled. "And that photographer's a prick."
"What?" She gave me a Mona Lisa-mysterious smile. "You're the caterer who figures things out, right?"
"I don't understand - " But the door was already closing. Figures out what? Gratefully, I stepped out into the pine-scented fresh air.
When I darted past racks of clothing, a sapphire-winged hummingbird swooped by. Sixty feet off the deck, the creek gurgled over a bed of rocks. Two mountain chickadees flirted on the elephant-shaped boulder. When a breeze tossed the aspens' lacy tops, movement caught my eye. Across the creek, a small herd of elk lowered their long necks to graze in a meadow that sloped to a broken wooden fence. Everything was serene and ordered: utterly unlike the contentious scene inside.
The redwood deck wrapped around the cabin. I made a path through the clothing racks and deck chairs, then arrived at another row of windows. I carefully placed the covered cheesecakes and spring rolls on a picnic table and checked my watch: ten more minutes. I trotted back to the front door.
Suddenly, the deafening noise of breaking glass split the air. Two feet in front of me, the picture window exploded. Shards burst over the deck. Across the creek, the elk bolted. I froze and waited for my heartbeat to slow. The projectile that had done the damage lay on its side among sparkling slivers of glass. It was Ian Hood's Polaroid.
I wondered if they'd ever get to lunch.
2
Inside, all was chaos. The models whispered fearfully. The handyman, his hammer in his hand, gaped at Ian Hood. Ian was shaking his fist at the shattered window.
"How many times have I asked for three new Polaroid cameras?" he screeched. "And I go to look for one, and trip over that damn compressor! Rufus, get the hell over here!"
Leah Smythe made soothing noises while the scruffy construction worker dropped his hammer and trotted to Ian's side. Hanna Klapper stood with her hands on her hips, judging the scene. Her face was a mask of fury.
I looked in horror at the buffet. The camera had cut a straight path through the food. The salad lay upended on the floor. Vinaigrette had spilled down the row of napkins and now dripped on strands of endive. Liquid-soaked rolls had landed topsy-turvy on the marble shelf. I scooted toward the kitchen.
Andr‚ was leaning against the doorjamb with his arms crossed. He gave me a dry, appraising look. "Eccentric diners always provide the best stories," he observed. "Is l my lunch canceled?"
"Let me check." Ian Hood stomped past me, headed for the cabin door. Leah Smythe followed at his heels, urging, I "C'mon, baby, we'll get the compressor out of the way, you won't trip over it again, don't give up - "
"Any chance we're still going to try to - " I began. But Leah ignored me and raced down the steps after the seething Ian.
At the buffet, Hanna delicately picked up the ruined rolls and piled them back into the basket.
"Ah, Hanna?" I ventured. "Goldy Schulz. I worked on your museum exhibits. Congratulations on your new job with P & G."
"Thank you." She sniffed and smoothed her clipped hair behind her ears. Her dark eyes challenged mine. "Do you know what my duties are?" But before I could answer, she went on, "Choosing the clothing to be photographed. Arranging the catalog layout. Selecting the models. Overseeing the shoot." Not temper-tantrum cleanup, in other words.
"Leave the pick-up to me," I exclaimed cheerfully, as if photographers flung cameras through windows and ruined my buffets all the time.
"We promised the models lunch." The authoritarian tone I knew so well was like a steel shaft through her voice. I nodded meekly, booted the metal housing that had come loose from the compressor back toward the rustic furniture, and leaned over to snatch a lettuce leaf from the floor. Hanna continued, "We must serve it."
Of course, I instantly recognized the clients' universal we, which means you, caterer. "It won't take ten minutes to set up on the deck." I turned and winked at her. "Andr‚ is incredibly versatile," I lied.
"That is certainly a good thing," Hanna muttered skeptically.
In the kitchen, Andr‚ had flicked on the oven light and was peering at his cake. "Lunch or no?" he demanded impatiently.
"Yes." I dumped the garbage and washed my hands. He grunted. "You should take the backup food, and leave." Right, I thought as I set a kettle of water on to boil for the chafing dish, and leave you with this mess. Within two minutes I had checked on the soup, loaded another tray with the backup platters of salad, vinaigrette, rolls, and butter, and was whisking it out to the picnic tables. I checked my watch: five past twelve. We weren't doing too badly, considering. I filled the chafer's bain-marie with the boiling water. Andre poured in the mushroom soup, then retrieved the burnt sugar cake. The smell was divine and I told him so. A rap at the kitchen door preceded Hanna's entry. Imperiously, she tapped at her watch.
"Right now," I promised as Andr‚ lofted the cake platter and I picked up the bowl of whipped cream.
I half expected the lunch to be rocky. The red-haired crew member with the thin beard introduced himself to me as Rufus Driggle, set-builder and still-life photographer. He told me to call him Rufus; he hated his last name. The work made him a hearty eater, Rufus went on to inform me, but he never gained any weight because he always had indigestion from dealing with Ian. He paused and stroked his beard. "I prefer working with the elk, actually." I nodded vaguely and replenished the buffet as the male models piled their plates high with cheesecake, salad, baguettes, and spring rolls.
The female models depressed me. Eschewing the cheesecake, breads, and salad dressing, they uniformly arranged a few greens on their plates next to one or two Asian spring rolls. Then, like bio-class dissectors, they pulled the rolls apart to extract the shrimp. I hoped Andr‚ wasn't watching, but of course he was. He hrumphed and concentrated on cutting the cake.
Hanna curtly announced that the cattle call for that day was over except for two more female models: Rustine and Yvonne. The agents of the remaining models I would be called later about a resumption of auditions. A groan went up from the group. Then all the women except for Rustine and the sharp-faced blonde, who I assumed must be Yvonne, made a beeline for Andr‚'s burnt sugar cake. They sliced themselves fat wedges, smothered them with whipped cream, then skulked to faraway chairs to eat in solitary silence. I started transporting dirty dishes back to the kitchen.
To my surprise, Andr‚ stood waiting at the front door. He held a basket bulging with a zipped bag of salad, a plastic-wrapped platter of spring rolls, and a steam-clouded jar of soup.
"Take this to your friend whose wife has pneumonia," he told me. "Your check is inside. I know what it is to have a sick wife, Goldy. Cater to your friend, and forget these other men upsetting you." He waved his free hand and enumerated them. "That idiot builder. That conniving caterer, Litchfield."
"You're the best," I replied, and meant it. I took the basket and thought of the pork butt I'd already roasted and wrapped. Cameron Burr would have food for three days. If only food could make his wife well again... Andr‚ murmured, "Where is the much-praised Julian Teller? Can't he help you beat this monster Litchfield?"
I shook my head. Two months ago, Julian had finished his freshman year at Cornell. He'd considered himself lucky to land a summer kitchen job at a swank upstate New York hotel. "Julian was supposed to come visit, but he never showed up. And his classes start next week." We had all been disappointed not to see Julian this summer. Arch, though, had felt Julian's absence most acutely.
"Go see your friend, Goldy. Have him tell you one of his stories of Nazi treasure. And stop worrying so much."
Clasping the basket, I hugged Andr‚ and hurried down the stone steps. Once across the creek, I trotted between the mud-blackened bank, the granite boulders, and a thickly packed heap of dry twigs, monument to the industry of beavers. A rising wind whistled through a nearby stand of yellow-tinged cottonwoods.
Most of the models had departed. The elk had returned to the meadow to graze. Beside my van, the breeze whiplashed a slew of white-faced daisies. Leggy thistle branches waved bright pink-purple tops and spilled hairy nests of silver seeds. The breeze shifted and wafted my scent toward the elk. They lifted their racks and trotted cautiously toward the safety of the trees. I unlocked the door, shoved the picnic basket onto the front seat, and thought of Andr‚'s words. Forget the men who were bothering me? How?
I revved the van. What I really needed was help from the main man in my life - Tom. I was terrified the county health inspector would descend on our home at any moment and deem that the cabinet-window mess left by Gerald Eliot wasn't technically a commercial kitchen repair, but a remodeling. Remodeling was illegal without pulling a permit and closing the kitchen. Tom had promised to help. But Andy Fuller, the prosecutor who was such a thorn in Tom's side, had just plea-bargained down to reckless driving a drunk driver's killing of six people on I-70. Tom's long, tempestuous meetings with Fuller precluded home maintenance.
I carefully negotiated the rocky road leading back to Blue Spruce. At the intersection with the highway, preoccupied with thoughts of Tom's troubles with Andy Fuller, I gunned the van and nearly hit a paint-peeled board announcing Swiss Inn Apartments - Seven Miles Ahead, West of Aspen Meadow, next to a Real Estate For Sale sign plastered with an Under Contract!!! sticker. I slowed and sloshed through the mud. Worry muddled my brain. Where was I? Oh yes, taking food to Cameron Burr, president of the Furman County Historical Society, an old friend whom I loved dearly, especially for the many tales of Aspen Meadow he'd told my son Arch. And the story Andr‚ had alluded to was Arch's favorite: the improbable myth that somewhere in the Colorado mountains, the Nazis had buried a stash of gold. Before Barbara got sick, she'd told me she and her husband were going to have to find that money, if they were ever going to payoff Gerald Eliot.
I turned at the road running by the You-Snag-Em, We-Bag-Em Trout Farm, drove another three miles, then rocked over the Burrs' puddle-pocked driveway. My apprehension grew. The last time I'd been to visit Cameron, he'd been home in the middle of the afternoon, battling anxiety with tranquilizers that he washed down with hot chocolate while listening to old Ravi Shankar tapes. He'd told me how he'd tried to help Gerald Eliot with his cash flow by getting him a job as a security guard at the Homestead Museum. But he still didn't come back to finish our sun room, Cameron had moaned. Join the club.