The Social Climber of Davenport Heights (24 page)

I groaned and shook my head.

“You just don’t give a lot of thought to what’s going on in this store at all,” I accused.

He shrugged. “When I’m writing about something, I get so into it that it’s really hard for me to pay attention to anything else.”

“So what are you writing?”

“I told you,” he said. “I write letters.”

“We all write letters,” I pointed out. “What is it that you’re into writing so much that you don’t notice your customers. A spy thriller? A treatise on Western philosophy? A history of baseball cards? Come on, confess.”

He shook his head. “I write letters,” he said. “I see things that cry out for change and I write to whomever I think might be able to do something about it.”

“Really? How long have you been doing that?”

He looked momentarily chagrined. “About twenty years, I guess.”

I whistled and we both laughed.

“Has anything you’ve written ever changed anything?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” he answered. “I don’t know what would have happened if I hadn’t written.”

“That’s fair,” I agreed. “You know, this is a very unusual hobby.”

“Maybe it’s not a hobby, maybe it’s a curse,” he replied. “I certainly spend plenty of my time cursing at that old Underwood.”

I glanced over at the typewriter he indicated. It was surrounded by little balls of crumpled-up paper.

“How did you get started doing this?” I asked.

He avoided the question. “Janey, that is a long and very boring tale,” he stated. “I’d much rather hear about you.”

“What about me?”

“Anything about you,” he said. “Tell me about your divorce.”

“My divorce? Why would you want to hear about that?”

He leaned forward in his chair as if eager to listen.

“It’s obviously on your mind,” he said. “You think that even your antique dealer is talking about it.”

I giggled again and shook my head. “There is really nothing to say,” I told him. “My husband left me for another woman, they are having a new baby very shortly and I…I’m moving on.”

Scott nodded slowly. “Been there, done that, got the T-shirt,” he said.

“Your wife left you?”

“Not for another woman,” he answered teasing. “Worse.”

“Worse?”

“She left me for a dentist.”

We both laughed.

“You don’t sound too broken up about it.”

“It was almost fifteen years ago,” he said. “They have four kids and she’s kind of fat now.”

“Oh, well, that’s okay then.”

“Yeah, I’d hate for her to be a hottie when I’ve turned into a gray old bachelor.”

“You still look pretty fine to me,” I said honestly, before having the time to think through the implications of such a statement.

He grinned, obviously delighted. “Why, thank you, Janey,” he said. “You’re blushing.”

“I’m not.”

“You are,” he insisted. “Almost as bright as your shoes.”

My shoes! I realized I was sitting there, legs crossed on his couch with the killer shoes right in his line of vision. I put my feet on the floor.

“Sorry,” I said.

“For what? Giving me a compliment? Blushing?”

“No, for the shoes.”

He looked puzzled.

Briefly I explained about Gil and the Guerras.

Scott found the whole story amusing.

“So, you wore these sexy, power shoes to give you the confidence necessary to talk some guy into a great real estate deal.”

“Yeah, basically,” I said.

“And you won,” he said.

“It wasn’t about winning,” I clarified. “The Guerras are a very safe bet for Gil to make. They are not at all likely to default. They have faithfully made monthly payments to that funeral home. And what would happen if they didn’t? Would the undertaker go out and dig the man up? That debt should have worked to prove what desirable borrowers they are. But because of the way the rules are set up, it worked against them, making them look less than able to buy.”

“Maybe the rules need changing,” he said.

“They are set up to winnow out those people who owe huge sums on credit cards,” I told him. “That’s not a bad idea—for the banks or for the folks with out-of-control spending. But not everybody’s situation fits so easily within the rules.”

“So you found a way around them,” he said.

I nodded. “Let’s just say I gave them the red shoe treatment.”

Scott laughed.

“They work every time,” I said, indicating my footwear.

He shook his head. “I think it’s less likely that these shoes are the ruby slippers and more likely that you, Janey Domschke, had the power within you all the time.”

“You make me sound diabolical.”

“The flip side of that is saintly,” he said. “What you did was close the deal and you did it on your own, without props.”

I held my foot up in the air, showing off both the red sandals and a good bit of leg.

“How can you say these aren’t magic?” I teased.

He smiled, warm enough to raise sea levels. “They certainly send
my
thoughts into the realm of fantasy,” he answered.

I realized I was flirting. It had been so long since I’d done so, I had forgotten that it was even in my repertoire. And the minute I saw what I was doing, I lost the ability to do it.

I was a single woman, alone in the company of a man, albeit one who was not my type, but an attractive man nonetheless. Only moments before, those facts had been innocuous. Now they were downright intimidating.

I put my foot back on the floor and nervously made sure that my skirt was pulled down over my knees. My heart was racing.

Glancing in his direction, I saw that he was watching me. There was no menace in that true-blue gaze, just curiosity and expectation.

To my surprise and great relief, he deftly changed the subject.

“So how did you get involved with the Hattenbacher House?” he asked me.

Business. I could talk business. I felt myself relaxing into the conversation.

“I was the Realtor for the place,” I said. “I found the developer, investors, got the area rezoned. Then I met Miss Heloise.”

“She was against it?”

“She had no idea,” I answered. “Her daughter-in-law had told her they were going to sell it. She’d agreed to give the place up, to go to a senior-care facility. She had no idea, until I told her, that we were going to level the place.”

“It was a really good thing you did,” he said. “Being honest with her.”

I was tempted to explain to him about the accident, about Chester, about my vow that night. I wanted him to understand that I wasn’t naturally a good person, that I didn’t do good things. But I held back. I had been flirting with the man. The memory of that still made me uneasy. I was careful about revealing too much.

“You know how I love antiques,” I said. “That house is just one giant, perfect-condition antique. And when I heard about the history…” I shook my head. “Tearing it down for condos would have been like painting a yellow happy face on the Mona Lisa.”

“Apparently the Jarman family didn’t feel the same way,” he said.

“Not exactly,” I replied. “I still hear quiet whispers that they might sue me for breach of contract, or get the real estate board to revoke my broker’s license.”

“Do you think either of those things will happen?”

“It’s possible, I suppose. But I don’t really think so,” I said. “Either way, I’m lying low. Miss Heloise asked me if I wanted to head up the foundation. I said no.”

“You weren’t interested?”

“I wasn’t uninterested,” I admitted. “But I just thought it would be more fuel to antagonize the family.”

“And you didn’t want to do that,” he said.

“I thought it might be dangerous to do that,” I said. “Not
just for me. They are still Miss Heloise’s family and they are still not to be trusted.”

He nodded. “And she doesn’t want to alienate them, I’m sure.”

“She doesn’t. The day she moved to the senior home, Barb came to see her and asked if she could have a couple of mementos from the house.”

“Oh no.”

“Oh yes,” I answered. “Miss Heloise thought it would be wonderful to keep something special in the family.”

“Nobody went with them.”

I shook my head. “They brought a moving van, right in the middle of the day, as if they had nothing in the world to be ashamed of.”

“They cleaned the place out?”

“No, fortunately they didn’t have time,” I said. “One of the neighbors called me. I got the police over there to stall them while I found a judge willing to order a
cease and desist
.”

“That’s good,” he said.

I nodded. “But they did get a lot of stuff,” I said. “It will be just one more challenge for the foundation to get donations of appropriate replacement pieces.”

“Oh, but, Janey, I know you’ll be up to the challenge,” he said.

T
HE DRIVE OUT
to Bluebonnet Manor Assisted Living came alive with the bright colors of wildflowers and the lush green of spring grass. I headed out there early one morning under a clear blue sky. When I pulled off onto the exit ramp, I lowered the top on the Z3. It was only a quarter-mile farther, but I wanted to feel a little bit of the warmth of sunshine on my face.

A car dealership had opened on the feeder road directly beside the freeway, cutting off Chester’s view of the road. If the place had been there the night of the accident, I would have died.

Strangely, thoughts like that no longer had the ability to send shivers up my spine. I no longer thought that my being saved was an unfathomable quirk of fate. I’d somehow come to the realization that there was a purpose for my being alive. I wasn’t certain what that purpose was, but I was determined to seek it out and try to fulfill it.

I pulled into my usual spot in the parking lot and headed inside. In the weeks following the amputation of his lower leg, Chester appeared to be not much changed. There had been no talk of an artificial limb, rehab, or walking again.

I understood that patients often became depressed and therefore reluctant to pursue that direction. But, I’d always thought that health-care workers were the cheerleaders for getting on with your life, learning to live with what you have. The people on the staff acted as if they were perfectly content to allow Chester to just lie in his bed for the rest of his life.

I didn’t understand it. And I really didn’t like it.

I began to insist that Chester be gotten up into his chair. If I went to visit and he was in bed, I immediately tracked down his nurse’s aide to get him up.

He let me do that. He let me grouse for him, nag for him, complain for him. But he was not at all interested in any discussion with me concerning his recent surgery, the state of his health or the quality of his care.

“In the nursing home we get to talk about our aches and pains all the time,” he told me. “When you’re here for a visit, I want to talk about something else.”

I tried to abide by his wishes. Though I continued to worry about him. The stump, just below his knee, didn’t seem to be healing up very fast and I was worried that he was perhaps not eating all that well. Maybe he needed vitamins.

Fortunately, one evening I left rather late and spotted a charge nurse whom I’d never seen before.

I went up and introduced myself and chatted for a few minutes. It was her first day on the job. She was in her mid-twenties, not all that much older than Brynn, bright and inquisitive, a very recent graduate of State University.

Uncharacteristically honest, I admitted it to be my alma mater, as well.

“Were you in one of the sororities?” she asked me.

I shook my head. “No, I lived quietly on the second floor of Alma Willard,” I said.

“You’re kidding!” Anje said. “I lived in Thatcher, but I had a friend who was in Willard. I studied in their Quiet Salon all the time.”

She updated me about the place, and I shared an historic anecdote or two. It had been a lifetime since I had even spoken about the four years that I’d lived there. The two of us became fast friends in five minutes.

“Listen, Anje,” I said finally. “I’m worried about Chester Durbin. I like Bluebonnet a lot, but I’m not sure that he’s really getting the best care here. Could you take a quick look at his chart? I’m thinking that a fresh set of eyes might see something.”

I assumed that being brand-new, she would have no vested interest in protecting her predecessors. That she would, at least, be able to give me some idea of how things were going with him, and she might just immediately see what more could be done.

“Anything in particular that you’re concerned about?” she asked me.

“Honestly, I’m worried about his nutrition,” I told her, not mentioning my own role in food consumption. I was still bringing him a Snickers at every visit. “He seems to have a pretty good appetite, but I’m not sure that he’s getting any stronger.”

Young Nurse Anje was already reaching for his chart when she asked, “He’s your dad, right?”

“I’m his niece,” I lied without hesitation. I was at least that, I assured myself.

“Let’s see,” she said, opening up the notebook that held almost a ream of paper, thick as the local phone book. She began riffling through the array of multicolored sheets and grafts, handwritten notes and test reports.

“Oh wow,” she commented after a couple of minutes, but continued to read without elaborating.

Across the lobby I spotted a couple of nurses’ aides, whom
I recognized, holding an impromptu confab. If either of them walked over to Anje’s desk and caught her revealing Chester’s medical information to me, I’d be
so
busted.

Intentionally I moved a little to the left so that I was standing between them and Anje. If they glanced in this direction I would be blocking their view of her looking through the chart. Hopefully, it would appear as if I was merely innocently wasting the young woman’s time.

“Actually, Jane, it looks like the staff has been keeping very close track of him,” she told me finally. “See these summary sheets.” She showed me a thick section of handwritten tables. “These are really rigorously detailed,” she said. “His diet is very regimented. And they’ve been keeping daily intake and output along with the blood monitoring since the day of his original admission.”

I nodded. That certainly sounded good.

“The staff has really been doing everything possible to keep him within normal range. And he’s been completely cooperative. I don’t find any reports of noncompliance. And you can imagine how rare that is!”

“Um,” I responded noncommittally.

Anje lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Some of these people, you just can’t turn your back on them for a minute, they are always sneaking something.”

I had no idea what she was talking about.

“Still,” she said sympathetically, “he
has
become very brittle over the last year, but that’s probably expected with his age and deterioration.”

Brittle
seemed a strange choice of word. I assumed she’d misspoken. She probably meant to say Chester was frail or weak. Both things were very true.

I glanced nervously over my shoulder. The two nurse’s aides had disappeared down the hall.

“You are right, of course, Anje,” I said. “It just seems as if Chester’s knee isn’t healing very fast since the amputation.”

She nodded and shrugged. “His circulation is terrible, of course. That is absolutely to be expected.”

I didn’t really know anything about old people, but I suppose I had heard that they often had trouble with circulation.

“Besides his internist, there are two specialists on consult,” she said. “Try not to worry, Jane. Your family has done everything possible to see he gets the best care.”

I left that night feeling somewhat better and having a little more respect for Chester’s nephew. I continued to see Anje from time to time when she was on duty. Apparently no one had ever told her that I wasn’t Chester’s niece, and when she saw me, she always volunteered rather benign information on how he was doing.

This particular Monday, as I made my way through the lobby and past the nurses’ station and down the hall to Chester’s room, I didn’t see her.

“Is anybody home,” I called out as I walked in.

The good news, Chester was sitting up in his wheelchair staring out the window. The bad news, he was thin and pale and gaunt.

He turned to smile at me. “You are here bright and early this morning,” he said.

“Early enough to catch you by surprise?” I asked.

“Well, you might have, but I saw you driving up in that fancy car of yours.”

I walked up and stood beside him. From the window I could see my convertible. The luxury two-seater looked incongruous among the minivans and sensible sedans in the nursing-home parking lot.

“It is a pretty fancy little car,” I admitted. “David bought it for me, of course. But it costs a fortune to maintain.”

Chester nodded.

“I like those little Volkswagens they sell down the hill there,” he said, pointing to the dealership that now blocked his view. “If I could drive, I think I’d buy myself one of those.”

I smiled. I suppose we’re never too old for new-car fever.

“How long has it been since you’ve driven?” I asked him.

He laughed and shook his head. “I couldn’t tell you,” he said. “I can’t even remember how long it’s been since I’ve
ridden
in a car. The danged nursing home transport puts me in the back and strapped down to a gurney.”

He laughed as if the image of himself, helpless and tied down in an ambulance-type vehicle, was funny. It wasn’t. But I laughed along with him. It just seemed like the thing to do.

“So, have you heard from Brynn?” he asked me.

I shook my head. “No, she still won’t take my calls. I don’t really want to talk about it.”

He nodded, understanding. “Then sit down and we’ll talk about something else,” he said.

I settled in. By now Chester knew all about my life. We discussed the people that were near and dear to me. The charities with which I had contact. My faltering real estate career. And my ongoing efforts to do good.

“Did you know the Special Olympics has a golf team?” I asked him.

“No, I don’t suppose I did,” he said.

“They are trying to teach the athletes leisure sports that they can participate in for a lifetime, rather than just team sports or track-and-field activities.”

“That makes sense,” he said.

“Locally they’ve got a men’s golf team that’s doing very well,” I said. “But they haven’t done anything about the women.”

“Jane, I thought you hated golf,” Chester said.

“Oh, I do,” I told him. “But I’ve figured out that I don’t have to actually
do
all the good that needs to be done. My friend, Teddy, is the new president of the Junior League. I talked her into including a Special Olympics women’s golf team in their list of civic service options.”

Chester frowned. “I thought you told me that 80 percent of the Junior League membership’s main reason for participating was social chumming.”

I shrugged. “That’s what the interest surveys indicate,” I said. “And that was me, exactly.”

“But you are still hoping that they will voluntarily choose to take this on?”

“Every member has to do a certain number of hours of community work,” I said. “I’m thinking that there are women who would look at this and think, ‘Hey, this is great. I can get in my charity hours and play golf at the same time.’”

“But are those the kind of people who should be working with mentally handicapped golfers?” he asked.

“Maybe,” I said. “What I’m thinking is that if
I
could change my priorities, perhaps other women will want to, as well. I am definitely not the kind of person that you would count on to be out there trying to do good. But that might be our problem, the world’s problem, all these millennia we’ve only expected doing good of the people we would expect it of. If we start expecting it of everyone, maybe we won’t get it from everyone, but we’ll get it from more people than we do now.”

Chester considered my words slowly, thoughtfully.

“You don’t think so?” I asked.

“Maybe,” he said. “But what about the young golfers with all their hopes up? What happens if all the Junior Leaguers who thought it would be easy and find out that it’s not, just quit. Won’t those girls be disappointed?”

My bright and sunny optimism turned to dismay.

“I hadn’t thought about that,” I admitted. “That would be awful!”

Chester nodded.

“It could be a terrible thing,” he agreed. “Or it could be just like you planned. Someone, given the opportunity, rises to the occasion.”

“Can I risk that?” I asked.

“Can you?” he threw the question back.

“Chester, you’ve been doing this a lot longer than me. Tell me what you think.”

He smiled like the wise old sage I believed him to be. “You can’t do a bait and switch, luring people into opportunities where success or failure is totally dependant upon the charitability of their nature. You’ve got to lessen the chance that they drop the ball by giving them a better idea of what they are getting into.”

“How would I do that?”

“Get the players from the men’s team to talk to the group, perhaps,” he said. “Or let the Junior Leaguers go and watch the partners interacting.”

“It will seem like too much trouble to a lot of them,” I said.

Chester agreed. “It will
be
too much for a lot of them,” he said. “But maybe not for all of them.”

“Maybe.”

“You’ve just got to do the best you can, Jane,” he told me. “And then you’ve got to trust that things will work out. They won’t always work out the way that you’d like. But they will always work out how they are supposed to.”

I left Chester a little before eleven, remembering to give him his Snickers bar.

“Thank you, Jane,” he said a bit more seriously than the gift warranted. “I’m going to put this away and save it for later.”

“You had better, mister,” I teased threateningly. “I don’t want you ruining your lunch.”

As I stopped at the traffic light across from the new car dealership, I glanced at the Volkswagens for sale. Chester had said he’d buy one if he could still drive. I shook my head. Only a guy like Chester would prefer a Volkswagen over the Z3. I looked over the array of shiny colors and styles. They were kind of cute.

I double-checked my cell phone. It hadn’t rung, but I made certain there were no messages, either. Brynn still hadn’t called. I held the cell phone in my hand thoughtfully. Two buttons to push, that’s all that it required. My Brynn was always only two buttons away. I could call her again. I resisted the action and stuffed the phone back in my purse.

I worried about her. I had spent most of my life swooping in to help her. When she tottered on toddler feet, I’d held my hands behind her to catch her when she’d fall. When she was a schoolgirl in navy blue wool, I had taken charge, smoothed the way and been a constant presence. In the social world I’d chosen her clothes, her activities, even her friends.