“Okay,” Sam said, shrugging. “How about a glass of wine and a fire? I need some time with you. Please?”
Izzy didn’t answer, but she slipped on her boots and shrugged into her jacket. The two of them walked silently out the back door, along the porch. Nell watched as Sam pulled her close, lowered his head. And then they disappeared into the blackness of the night.
Ben drew her attention back.
“Let’s polish off these last couple inches, Kevin,” he said, emptying the bottle of cabernet into the glasses. “Better than Nyquil.”
Kevin took the wine with a half smile.
Weariness spread through his body as he drained his glass. His expression was grave and thoughtful at once.
“I suppose I was the likely person for her to try to divert attention to,” he said. “The police already had reason to suspect me because Troy had planted that wallet in my locker. He wanted them looking at me, not him, so he could go about his business of blackmailing Nancy. I guess he wouldn’t have wanted them looking at Nancy, either. She was his ticket out of here.”
“You were around all the time. It was easy to assume you’d know where tools were, what people’s schedules were,” Nell said. “She was frightened. Nancy so rarely couldn’t control things. She was beginning to unravel.”
Ben reached for their coats and handed one to Nell, then Birdie.
Birdie slipped hers on and walked around the table to Kevin. She stood between Mary and Kevin and wrapped Kevin in a hug, her arms barely circling his shoulders.
“It happens to all of us, sweet Kevin,” she whispered in his ear. “It’s been a long haul. But it’s over.”
Chapter 30
Nell stood next to Ben in front of the fireplace, looking up into Enzo Pisano’s wide gray eyes. A roaring fire crackled, heating their legs and arms.
“You’re blushing,” Ben said, wrapping an arm around her shoulder.
Nell lifted a hand to her warm cheek. “The fire. The evening. You.”
“It’s good to know I can still bring fire to your cheeks.”
Nell smiled and leaned into his side. “Enzo would love all this.”
“Every minute of it.”
“It’s good, isn’t it? All of it.”
Ben looked down at his wife of nearly forty years. He nodded. “Yes, it is.” Ben understood the touch of sadness in his wife’s voice, intrinsically mixed with joy.
It had been a long week, from putting a murder behind them—to celebrating the living. With the Pisanos’ tragedy put to rest, they could concentrate more fully on those they loved.
Ben had known about Sam’s journey for a few days, but Sam had asked him not to talk about it. It was the way Sam handled things, Ben said. He was careful. But it was probably more about caring than anything else. Caring for Izzy. Once you see your life taking a turn, he’d said to Ben, you check all directions to make sure there’s nothing bad around the corner. Surprises you don’t want in your life—or in someone else’s.
He loved Izzy, he said, although no one needed to be told that.
And if they were ever to consider an honest future, he needed to know more about himself. History, medical things, like the genes he carried. So he’d gone back to Kansas and Colorado, pulled out records, asked lots of questions. He found out little about his birth parents. Hippies, he was told. Lived in communes. Came from California. But nothing that answered the pressing questions in his head.
So he’d checked himself into Boston General and subjected himself to every test known to man. Hereditary predispositions. Carrier testing. Sperm counts. All sorts of things he’d never thought about, not until Izzy became the center of his life.
“Why didn’t you tell her what you were doing?” Nell had demanded, her relief tangled up in Izzy’s anguish.
Ben had shushed her and told her to listen.
“Because I know your niece so well,” Sam had answered quietly. “Izzy would have said it didn’t matter. That she only cared about me. And she would have believed it. But I needed to know for myself what I had to offer her. Alone. It’s my way.”
It wasn’t the words, really, but the emotion behind them that convinced Nell he was right. We all needed to be true to ourselves, whatever that meant or how it worked. She thought of Izzy’s love for babies, the look in her eyes when she held them. Maybe Sam knew a part of her that even she hadn’t been privy to.
When the final tests came back, he’d sat Izzy down and shared his journey. He didn’t know his parents, but he knew he had good, decent genes, as far as medical science could report, anyway.
Nell brushed her head against Ben’s shoulder. She could stay right here in Enzo Pisano’s living room, the flames crackling, the music playing, for a long, long time, and be happy.
Mary had flung open the doors to Ravenswood-by-the-Sea to the whole town. It was a joyous Christmas Eve. Soon guests would begin filling the rooms of the bed-and-breakfast. Tonight it was all about friends and neighbors, about the holidays, and Mary had pulled out all the stops.
Across the room, the Scaglias sat with the Wootens, Mayor Stan Hanson was there with his wife, Roberta. Willow Adams and Pete Halloran were engaged in deep conversation, their heads inclined toward each other. A lovely sight, in Nell’s mind.
They waved to the Garozzos and Brandleys, to Annabelle Palazola cradling her grandbaby as her daughter Liz and husband Alphonso looked on, not letting the baby get far from their sight. Mary Pisano moved from group to group, welcoming everyone, thanking people for the cards and generous housewarming gifts they’d sent—the dozens of poinsettias filling the hallways, silver and crystal ornaments dripping from the branches of the enormous tree. But it wasn’t the gifts; it was what they meant, why they’d been sent; that’s what Mary said.
Nell and Ben moved through the crowded living room, through the halls, and beyond the winding staircase. They spotted Ham Brewster in the den, and he met them at the door, kissing Nell beneath the mistletoe hanging from the wide doorway. Jane, holding Henrietta O’Neal’s arm, waved at them from a table across the room. It was filled with Kevin’s bacon-wrapped figs and enormous mushrooms stuffed with crab and arugula, fruit plates and Christmas cookies, tiny roast beef sandwiches with horseradish dressing, and heaped platters of lobster rolls.
The paneled room had been Enzo’s library, and still held his comfortable leather chairs and collection of books. The eight-foot-high ceiling had walnut beams crossing from side to side. French doors opened up to the porch.
A waiter appeared, a tray of champagne glasses balanced in his hands.
Jane beckoned them over to the food table. “An amazing spread. Ham and I went to the kitchen to tell Kevin as much, but we left when Danny Brandley and Kevin began discussing which one of them makes the best chowder. It looked like it might turn into a duel.”
“It’s fortunate Cass has found a man who cooks,” Nell said.
“I heard my name,” Cass called out, weaving around Elliott Danvers, heatedly discussing football play-offs with Jerry Thompson.
“Of course I found a man who cooks. It was the number one priority—well, next to being witty and good-looking and charming and kind to dogs and an amazing mystery writer.” She lifted one shoulder in a shrug and grinned. “They’re a dime a dozen.”
“So where are the other kids?” Henrietta asked, causing another chorus of chuckles.
“The kids? Wellllll,” Cass drew out the word for effect. “Two of the kids have disappeared.” She turned and looked through the French doors, waving her arms dramatically. “I think they’ve gone off into the winter night. Two lost souls.”
Beyond the windows and the porch, the lawn’s pathways were lit with low lights, a winding maze from the porch all the way back to the woods. Spotlights beneath the enormous trees cast beams up into the snow-crusted branches. It was a winter wonderland.
As her eyes adjusted to the night, Nell spotted two figures walking toward the house, their arms looped around each other, their gait as slow as if it w
ere the sunniest of summer days.
At first, taking in the scene playing out in front of her, Nell was oblivious to the weather. But then the white flakes grew plump, dancing in the icy air, twirling around, touching the ground.
“It’s snowing,” someone behind her said.
And then the flakes began to fall in earnest, growing in size and number, until the sky was white with wonder.
The couple drew closer to the house. Sam and Izzy, their hair flecked with snow, their faces lifted to the sky, tongues catching dancing flakes. Rich laughter.
Jubilant laughter.
Nell opened the French doors, and they all crowded in the opening, caught up in the wonder of the night—the snow falling in front of them, the crackling fire at their backs. In the distance, the bells of Our Lady of the Seas began to ring, rolling down the hills and narrow streets, filling the town with joy.
Izzy and Sam walked up onto the porch.
Izzy walked over to Nell and wrapped her scarf around her aunt’s neck. “You’re crying, Aunt Nell.”
Nell brushed the moisture away, oblivious of the cold. She held Izzy’s gaze fast. “Izzy—”
Izzy’s laugh was as light as the snowflakes and as rich as the emotion swirling around inside Nell. “I’m crying, too.”
She lifted one hand in front of Nell’s brimming eyes. A deep blue diamond sparkled. “Do you think Mary would like to have a wedding here? They say it brings good luck. Peace and prosperity. But then, I’d always thought your backyard would be nice. . . . ”
And then she melted into her aunt’s arms.
Sam stood beside Ben a few steps away. He watched the two women for a minute or two. And then he crossed the distance in an easy stride, and his big arms collected Izzy and pulled her close as if he’d never let go.
In the distance, the music changed. The CD quieted, and live guitars, drums, and the keyboard of the Fractured Fish filled the rooms and hallways of the bed-and-breakfast.
The partygoers hushed as Pete’s and Merry’s voices blended together, and their hearts belted out the familiar words, words about friendship, about being together. Magical words. And by the song’s end, a chorus of robust voices, young and old, joined in and filled Mary Pisano’s Ravenswood-by-the-Sea with holiday joy:Hang a shining star upon the highest bough.
And have yourself a merry little Christmas now.
The Seaside Knitters Knit-a-Square Projects
Nell, Izzy, Birdie, and Cass and dozens of Sea Harbor knitters joined together to knit hundreds of eight-inch squares for orphaned (and vulnerable) children in South Africa who have been infected with AIDS. They found they could knit the colorful squares easily and anywhere—in Harry’s Deli, at Coffee’s, or sitting on Nell’s deck. Then they sent them off to Aunt Ronda and her team of volunteers from Soweto to make into warm blankets for the orphans. The project is one of many created by KasCare, a wonderful nonprofit begun by an amazing Australian family, the McDonalds. Please visit their Web sites to learn more about their projects, to see photos of blankets, and to see the beautiful children they keep warm. The Web sites will also provide information on how to send your own squares or other knitting projects to South Africa.
http://www.kascare.org/
http://www.knit-a-square.com
Simple Knit-a-Square Pattern
(But you can be as creative as the Seaside Knitters and their friends, adding cables, patterns, borders—as long as your finished piece is an eightinch square. Have fun!)
Materials • Worsted wool and wool blends or acrylic. One square usually uses a 3.5-ounce ball of yarn or mix-and-match scraps
• 1 pair size 10 needles
• Darning needle
Instructions 1. Cast on 32 stitches. (Measure your gauge to be sure this equals 8 inches. Adjust as needed.)
2. Row 1: knit.
3. Row 2: knit. These two rows form the garter-stitch knitting pattern for your square.
4. Continue knitting as per these two rows until you have knitted a square.
5. To ensure that your knitted piece is 8 inches square, either use a tape measure or form a triangle by folding one corner of your square over to meet the opposite corner. If all sides are equal—then you have a square!
6. Cast off. (Be sure to leave a 1¼-yard length of yarn attached to the square to be used to join your square to other squares.)
7. Sew in yarn ends using a darning method.
Knit-a-Square Bunting
• Courtesy of Anne Powell •
These tiny buntings will keep infants warm and cuddled. Experiment with color and stripes, but use a close weave, such as a garter stitch, to avoid gaps and guarantee warmth.
Finished dimensions: 25-inch circumference, 25-inch length, including ribbed cuff
Materials
• 14 ounces (4 skeins) soft worsted-weight yarn
• 1 29-inch size 13 circular knitting needle
• 1 stitch marker
• 1 pair size 13 straight knitting needles
Instructions
Knit with 2 strands of yarn held together.
1. Using circular needles, cast on 68 stitches.
2. Knit 2, purl 2 for 5 inches.
3. Place stitch marker on needle for beginning of first round.
4. Join the ends of the ribbing together and knit in the round (garter stitch) until KasCuddle is 24 inches long from top edge of ribbing.
5. Using straight needles and beginning at marker, knit 2 together onto straight needles to end of row (34 stitches on needle).
6. Knit next row to marker.
7. Next row: knit 2 together on the straight needles to end of row at marker (17 stitches on needle).
Remove stitch marker.
Cut yarn, leaving a 10-12-inch tail. Thread yarn needle with tail and pull through remaining 17 stitches.
Draw up tight and secure. Sew in loose ends.
Check http://www.knit-a-square.com for mailing instructions and more ideas.
A Holiday Yarn Page 24