The Deception of the Emerald Ring (51 page)

"Without a second thought," Colin reassured me.

"Good." I beamed at him before remembering that beaming probably wasn't appropriate when a parent was in the hospital. "She is doing better?"

"Much. It wasn't anything life-threatening to begin with, but it was someone from hospital calling, not Mum—she was out cold. All I caught was that there'd been a car accident and she was in hospital, unconscious."

"Scary," I said, making a sympathetic face.

"Her husband was away at a conference, and my Italian is purely rudimentary. Enough to ask for grappa, but when it comes to medical terms—" Colin spread his hands in an endearingly boyish gesture of bafflement.

"But they cleared it up once you got there?"

"With a great deal of pointing at the relevant phrases in an Italian-English dictionary. Once we established that she had neither gangrene nor leprosy, it went swimmingly."

"Surely there must have been someone who spoke English?"

"Probably off on coffee break," said Colin dryly. "Or just enjoying watching the English bloke make a prat of himself."

"You never know, they might have just been on strike," I provided. "I gather that's pretty much the norm over there."

"All English speakers go slow for a day?"

"It gives whole new meaning to the English-Speaking Union! Maybe that's what happened to the mimes. Being French, they went on strike, and have been doomed to communicate through hand signals ever since, like linguistic gypsies."

Don't ask me where the mimes came from. They just popped out, and once out, refused to go back.

"And the painted faces?"

"An attempt to go incognito, so people won't keep shutting them into boxes. Naturally."

"Naturally," agreed Colin, looking rather bemused. "I don't know why I didn't think of it before."

"It takes a superior intelligence. And years of painstaking observation of the mime in its natural habitat." I hoped Colin wouldn't ask what that was, since I had no idea. Every now and again, my mouth detaches from my brain, and horrible things happen. "How did we get on mimes, again?" I asked hastily.

"It all comes back to the French, somehow or other." Cinching the belt of his raincoat closed—tied, not buckled—he asked, "How is the Pink Carnation?"

"Never been better," I said cheerfully, concealing my disappointment at the signs of his imminent departure. Why wouldn't he leave? He had said he had another event to go to, and I was probably making him late as it was. "She just foiled a rebellion in Ireland."

"I had a feeling she might."

"You mean you knew about it already."

"There is that."

"But I know something you don't know."

"If it has to do with mimes, I don't need to know."

I folded my arms across my chest in exaggerated disgust. "We are just not going there again." Having dismissed the mimes, I lowered my voice dramatically. "What would you say if I told you that, rather than just one Black Tulip, there might have been an entire syndicate of them?"

"How do you mean?" Colin leaned back against the creampainted wall as though he had no intention of going anywhere at all.

"I mean, not one, but a series of subagents, all with very pale skin and black hair. The petals of the Tulip."

"It sounds rather fantastic."

"It is," I agreed. "Only not in the way you mean."

I gave him a quick rundown on my week's archival discoveries, starting with the advent of Miss Emily Gilchrist and finishing up with the marquise's mysterious death in the parlor of Lord Vaughn.

"Aren't you a bit short on petals?" asked Colin. "It takes more than two to cover a flower."

I had to stop and count on my fingers. Surely there had to have been more dark-haired agents than just the marquise and Emily Gilchrist but if there were, I hadn't found them yet.

"Of course, it's all still conjecture at this point," I said hastily. "But wouldn't it be wonderful?"

For a long moment, Colin didn't say anything at all. He just looked at me, until I could feel my damnably fair skin begin to flush under his scrutiny.

"Wonderful," he agreed, just before the pause reached epic proportions. "I'm sure Jay contributed many brilliant insights."

It took me a moment to remember who Jay was. "Don't remind me. I'm trying to blot that evening out of my memory."

"Aren't you ?"

"Oh, God, no." I hastened to disabuse him of the notion. Forget the fact that I was the one who put the notion into his head in the first place. Right now, all I wanted to do was excise the whole ridiculous Jay episode and go back to where we had been a week or so ago. "I only went out with him to placate Grandma. Since he's in England and I'm in England it's just easier not to argue with Grandma."

"That is a relief."

"Really?" I went into a full-scale head-tilt, complete with breathy voice and fluttering lashes.

"Yes. He seemed rather a git."

Damn. I couldn't argue with the analysis, but I'd been hoping for something a little more along the lines of "Darling, I wanted you for myself. I couldn't bear to see you so close to the arms of another man."

Ah, well. That's what old movies and cartons of Ben & Jerry's were for, to make up the deficiencies in real life. If this were a black-andwhite movie, I would already be clutched in his manly arms, assuring him that Jay meant nothing to me, nothing at all.

Instead, I got Pammy, wearing enough fur for any three starlets.

"Hi, you two!" she caroled, bumping into me.

I think she meant to knock me into Colin, but her aim was off. Instead, I banged my elbow into the wall with enough force to bring tears to my eyes. Subtlety personified, that's our Pammy.

"Ouch," I said.

"Sorry." Pammy didn't sound the least bit sorry. She turned her hostess smile on Colin, an uncanny mirror of her mother's, only with more of her gums showing. "Are you sure you can't stay for dinner? Really, really sure?"

"I wish I could, but I have to meet someone " Colin glanced at his watch, a simple silver-framed piece with a leather band. "Five minutes ago."

"I feel bad for having kept you," I said.

"Haven't we already had this discussion?"

"Do you have a date?" Pammy overrode both of us.

"You could say that." I did my best to keep my facial muscles in proper order, rather than drooping like a sad clown. An unmarried, heterosexual male—a tall, cute, unmarried heterosexual male—couldn't possibly be single. I should have expected that he'd be seeing someone, even if it were only an early-days, casual-dating sort of thing. "With my friend Martin."

Right. Martin. Relief flooded in, followed by doubt. Wait—did this mean he wasn't straight, after all?

He was suspiciously well groomed for a straight man. His dark blond hair exuded a clean shampoo smell, and that was definitely aftershave I had scented as I banged into the wall next to him. True, his clothes tended toward the outdoorsy, but that might just be an affectation, like those gay-straight men who affected deep interest in tools and car parts. He had said she could call it a date .

I was officially resigning from the human race. It was all just too much trouble.

"Martin," pressed Pammy. "As in Martin?"

What else could Martin stand for?

"Well, have fun!" I broke in before Pammy could embarrass herself further. Or embarrass me. As I knew from the sixth-grade dances, Pammy is, and has always been, largely embarrassment-proof. Mom's theory is that it comes from having an unsettled home life.

"Thanks. I'm not sure how much fun it will be, though. Martin's girlfriend chucked him last week."

Not gay, then. At least, Martin wasn't. As for Colin, the jury was still out. On just about everything. My personal jury is notoriously indecisive.

"Poor Martin." Pammy allowed a moment for mourning before following up with, "Is he cute?"

"What about your I-banker?" I demanded.

Pammy made a face. "He's being transferred to their Hong Kong office."

"Ah," I said wisely.

"Ah?" inquired Colin.

"Absence makes the heart go wander," I explained.

Colin looked quizzically at Pammy. "His, or yours?"

"Both," replied Pammy emphatically.

Across the coatrack, Colin's and my eyes locked in shared amusement.

I hastily looked away.

"Aren't you late?" I asked, nudging Pammy ahead of me out of the hallway to clear the way. "It seems cruel to keep poor Martin waiting. He'll think you've abandoned him, too."

"Call him and invite him over!" Pammy tossed back over her shoulder as I propelled her into the front hall. "The best way to get over a breakup is to get out there again. Right, Ellie? You can't just let him stay at home and mope. Or he might not have another date for, like, a year."

"At least let the guy have a decent mourning period," I remonstrated. "It takes a while to get over a breakup."

"Only if you let it take a while. It's all about positive thinking."

"And cosmos?" That had been Pammy's last breakup prescription. Take four cosmos, go out clubbing, and call her in the morning.

"I don't think he's in the mood for new people," said Colin tactfully. "But, thank you."

"Another time, then. We could all do drinks." I could see the Machiavellian wheels in Pammy's head churning up images of potential double dates.

"Won't you be seeing someone else by the time the mourning period is over?"

"I like to keep a backup list," said Pammy blithely. "You never know when they might come in handy."

"Like understudies," I explained to Colin, as the three of us filtered out into the front hall. "She keeps them in the wings in case the principal is unable to go on."

"Or sent to Hong Kong?"

"Happens all the time."

"Isn't it time to call your understudy in from the wings? Now that Jay has been sent back to grandmother?"

I glanced back up over my shoulder at him, turning down the corners of my mouth in feigned regret. "I'm not nearly as well organized as Pammy. My backstage is totally empty."

"That will never do." I couldn't see his face, but I could hear the amusement in his voice. "You need to restock."

"I haven't really had time to set up any auditions." The stage analogy wasn't entirely inapt; my heart was beating as though I were walking a tightrope as I paused next to the front door and turned to face him. "Except the hideous Jay one, and you saw how that one turned out."

"You ought to get back out there."

"Hear, hear!" said Pammy. "I've been telling her that for ages."

"Thanks, Pams."

Colin paused with one hand on the doorknob, and glanced casually down at me. "What are you doing Saturday night?"

I was supposed to be having dinner with Pammy. A swift kick from Pammy informed me that our plans were officially off.

"Nothing."

"Dinner?"

"One of my favorite meals."

"How does eight sound?"

Like a host of celestial angels singing. "Like an excellent time for dinner."

Next to me, I could feel Pammy bristling with repressed commentary.

"Brilliant," said Colin.

That had all happened a little too fast for me.

Did I have a date with Colin? Or was that just an abstract inquiry into the desirability of eight o'clock as a dining hour? It wasn't the sort of thing one could ask without looking really, really stupid.

Besides, Colin was busy thanking Pammy for a lovely evening, and Pammy was smirking in a way usually reserved for successful fairy godmothers. Any moment now she was going to sprout a tutu and start singing "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo."

The niceties disposed of, Colin poked his head around the door one last time. "Till Saturday, then."

"Don't forget your audition materials!" I twinkled.

Fortunately, the door was already swinging shut, placing three inches of good, solid oak between Colin and my silly comments.

I really hoped he hadn't heard that.

I lowered my head to my clenched hands. "Audition materials. Oh, God. I didn't."

Pammy snickered. "It could have been worse. At least you didn't say his audition piece."

"Pammy!"

"Do you think it's a long audition piece?"

I whacked Pammy on the arm. "That's not what I meant. We're just having dinner."

Pammy waggled her eyebrows. "Dinner, eh?"

"Oh, Pams." Overflowing with joy to the world and goodwill toward men, I gave her a quick hug. "Thanks."

"You're welcome." Pammy patted my back complacently. "Now who's making fun of Mustafa and the mountain?"

I didn't even bother to correct her. I was too happy. She could have all the Mustafas she wanted.

"I have a date."

"Uh-huh," said Pammy benignly.

"With Colin."

"That's him."

"I have a date with Colin."

Pammy slipped an arm through mine and began propelling me back toward the living room. "Okay, we got that. But you can't just get complacent. You have to think about the important things. Like, what you're going to wear."

Dinner. Saturday. Eight o'clock. It all sounded pretty incontrovertibly date-ish. Even allowing for transatlantic cultural differences, "Saturday" and "date" tend to be synonymous.

I had a date with Colin! A real date with Colin!

From the kitchen wafted the unmistakable scents of roasting turkey and yams swimming in syrup. Warm, homey smells vested with a wealth of good feelings, like lemon polish and clean linen. A deep feeling of contentment welled within me, the sort you have when you're very little, and the sun is shining, and your parents suggest ice cream without your even having to wheedle for it. All was right with the world. I had a whole new angle for my dissertation, turkey and American accents for Thanksgiving, and a date with a handsome Englishman on Saturday. A man who didn't confuse the Pimpernel with pumpernickel. Life couldn't get much better than this, not for all the Jimmy Choos in China.

With a little smile, I remembered the compositions we had to write each November in Lower School. They invariably began, "I have reason to be thankful because " At the time, it usually had a lot to do with My Little Pony and naturally curly hair, with the occasional pious reference to loving parents thrown in for ballast.