by Annie Bryant
I nodded. “An old woven bag and some sticks with fibers that reminded me of paintbrushes. We tried not to touch anything.”
Mr. Guerrero shook his head in amazement. Xochitl grabbed the notebook out of her father’s hands. She rapidly flipped to the pages where I’d made some sketches, and put it up to his face. Her father began to focus on it. His eyes got large. Xochitl flipped a page. His eyes became larger. She flipped to another page, where I’d sketched the tall main figure. He finally tore his eyes away from it and looked at me.
“You drew these?”
I nodded. “As many as I could. We counted almost thirty smaller paintings, and then there was this one big one. Here, I have pictures too.”
He scrolled through the images on my camera quickly. “Hector Ruiz does not…nobody knows about this?”
I nodded. Mr. Guerrero obviously thought this was a big deal. Xochitl began to hop. “Will Isabel get in trouble?” she asked.
His smile crowded the room. “Not for this. But let’s get out of here so you can tell us the whole story. Do you want to see the Alamo?”
“Do I ever!” I cried.
“Good,” he said. “We’ll drive by. But then we’ll go visit the other missions, the Mission San Francisco de la Espada, Mission San Juan Capistrano, and Mission Concepción. Those are the true beauties of the Old Mission Trail.”
CHAPTER 13
The Chef Shuffle
When Mr. Guerrero pulled up in front of the ranch at the end of the day to drop me off, I immediately spotted my mom sitting on the front porch and ran to her. Mr. Guerrero and Xochitl followed me onto the porch. “Mom, can we invite Xochitl and her parents to the quince?” I begged.
“I think we can arrange that, Isabel.” She addressed Xochitl’s father. “Cesar, will you and your family please join us tomorrow night for my daughter Elena Maria’s quinceañera?”
“Certainly, Mrs. Martinez. Xochitl and I would love to meet the honored young lady.”
I giggled. I just couldn’t help myself. Things were finally looking up, in a big way!
Just then Uncle Hector stepped out onto the porch. “I thought I heard a truck out here. Buenos tardes, Cesar. Thank you again for bringing our little Isabel home.”
“Ah, Hector. Just the man I was looking for. May I speak to you for a moment, privately? It is a matter of…art.”
“Of course, of course,” Uncle Hector told him, drawing him to the side of the porch. While the two of them talked, Xochitl and I told my mom all about our incredible day…leaving out the part about the cave art. I wanted to find the perfect time to reveal my big discovery to her.
When Uncle Hector and Mr. Guerrero were finished talking, my uncle looked pale, and he gave me a funny look. I knew they must have been talking about the cave. Mr. Guerrero nodded at me, then winked at Xochitl. “Come on, daughter. Time to head home,” he told her.
“See you tomorrow!” I called out after her.
Elena Maria met me right inside the door to the house. She smiled sweetly at Uncle Hector as he walked past us and then morphed into Quince-zilla again right before my eyes.
“Isabel, Mom told me where you’ve been all afternoon,” she said, stopping me in my tracks. “Do you understand how much work there is to do here? Decorations, favors, cooking, practicing hair and makeup. It’s stressing me out just talking about it! I can’t believe you would spend the day before my quinceañera hanging out with some girl you just met, and not me. Your sister.”
I couldn’t believe it. My sister actually missed me. I gave her a big hug while I explained enthusiastically, “She’s my new friend, Elena. You’ll get to meet her. Mom and I invited her to the quince…and I know you’ll love her.”
She was outraged. “You invited some strangers to my party?” she shouted as she pulled away from me.
“Elena Maria!” my mother said, coming in through the front door. She must have heard our conversation. “Control yourself. The Guerreros are friends of Hector and Inez, and I invited them. But Isabel, some of this is true. I’m glad you had fun this afternoon, but now we need to focus on the quince. Let’s help your sister.”
“Mami, Papa just called but we missed him,” Elena Maria said, sounding annoyed. “I was in the pool and didn’t hear the phone ring. Mercedes answered and told him you were outside, and he told her not to bother us. He said he couldn’t actually pin down ‘an arrival time.’” Elena Maria sighed. I heard her mumble, “This is the craziest, most mixed-up party ever!”
My mother wasn’t even irritated by the news.
“What is going on, Mami?” She pretended that she didn’t hear my question.
“Isabel, tomorrow is an important day, one we’ve all waited for for a long, long time. I hope you both remember to reflect on the spiritual meaning of this celebration. Please, act gracious to everyone, including one another.”
I snuck a quick look at Elena Maria, and at exactly the same time, she snuck a look at me. We cracked up. This time we had a real hug. My sister took off to find her friends, who were having a ferocious card game in the billiards room. I could hear the guys giving each other a hard time. “Oooh, you just got slapped with an ace from the Scott-ster.” “Oh yeah, well, watch out for this Andy-Attack, comin’ at ya! Whoa!”
Mom said she was going to take a little nap, and I went to the kitchen to fix myself a snack. Ricardo was in there, peeling potatoes. He wore a huge white apron tied at the neck and at his waist. Enrique and Fidencia huddled at the stove, having what looked like a tense discussion. The cooks reminded me of the diva chefs from Elena Maria’s favorite TV cooking show.
“What’s up with the prison chores?” I asked Ricardo.
He shrugged. “Part of my ‘consequences’ for the cave thing. A couple of minutes ago my dad marched into my room and told me I needed to get down here and help out in the kitchen. Did you tell him about the cave art?” he asked accusingly.
“No! Mr. Guerrero did. He took us to the Witte and I saw the exhibit on rock art they have there. Xochitl told her dad about the art. So I showed him the notebook and the pictures, and then he had this whole private conversation with your dad when he dropped me off.”
“Yeah, well, my father also said I put you in ‘danger.’”
“He doesn’t know how courageous you were. Like capturing the water? I’ll tell him the whole story. Then he’ll think you’re a hero,” I assured Ricardo. No matter how goofy he was, I really did feel like he had kind of saved my life. “Anyway, Mr. Guerrero said he would contact some friends of his at the university. He was pretty blown away by our pictures and the sketches. Ricardo.” I checked to make sure Enrique and Fidencia weren’t listening and told him, “We might have made an important art discovery.”
Just then a spoon clattered to the floor. Enrique and Fidencia started to shout at each other.
“More eggs!” she yelled at her husband.
“No. More flour,” he countered.
“Eggs!”
“Flour!”
Fidencia stared at her husband with dragon eyes. I was pretty sure smoke was about to come out of her nostrils. “You want more flour? Here is your flour!” With that, she grabbed a whole bag of white flour and dumped it over his head.
I clapped my hand over my mouth and looked at Ricardo, who was wide-eyed behind his glasses. Enrique sputtered and blinked, trying to get the flour out of his eyes. Finally he took off his apron. He hung it on the wall, and said in a most gentlemanly voice, “I am off to Sonora, to stay with my brother. I will return in a month to pick up my things. So have them ready!” Then he walked out.
Fidencia cupped her ample cheeks in her hands. “Dios mío!” she exclaimed. She turned to Ricardo and, speaking in Spanish, just as calmly said the following:
“My work is done here. The entire menu is prepared and ready for tomorrow, except for the cake. Bake five individual two-layer cakes, and frost each on the outside with buttercream icing, food coloring to be added at the cook’s discretion. For the icin
g between the layers, I suggest a pineapple-lemon filling.”
With that, she dramatically removed her apron and handed it to Ricardo, whose face was now white with shock.
“I will phone my sister in the city and have her pick me up immediately. Please tell Don Hector and Doña Inez it’s been a pleasure working here and helping to raise you children for the last ten years. I will settle my salary account in two weeks.” She left the kitchen.
Ricardo and I stared at each other. Dios mío was right!
“What do we do now?” Ricardo turned to me like I somehow had an answer, which I didn’t. “Isabel, you and I have taken a ride on the trouble train this week.” Ricardo shook his head.
He was right about that. I didn’t want any more trouble—not before my sister’s quince. I began pacing around the kitchen like a goose being chased by a dog. I flapped my arms up and down and charged every which way. Suddenly I stopped.
“Wait here,” I directed Ricardo as I hurried out of the kitchen, on a mission to save my sister’s quince. I raced down the hall and skidded to a stop outside the billiards room. I found just the person I needed, playing air hockey.
“Got a few minutes, Scott? We have an emergency in the kitchen.”
He perked up. “In the kitchen?” I could practically see the gears turning in his brain. Scott wanted to have a TV cooking show when he grew up, and he was already an awesome cook, just like my sister.
“It’s a culinary”—my sister taught me that term—“emergency,” I explained as we headed out. “Enrique and Fidencia just quit! And we need a cake…a big cake for the party tomorrow.”
“They quit? That’s intense. Just now?”
“No kidding. Ricardo and I were just standing there when they started yelling at each other about eggs and flour, then Fidencia dumped flour on Enrique’s head!”
“Whoa!” Scott thought about what I’d said. “Wow. And they seemed so happy. Just goes to show you never know. Okay, show me the way.” He put on a serious face and said, “Iron Chef Scott to the rescue!” I almost cracked up, but I managed to keep it together. Scott could be as goofy as he wanted, as a long as he baked Elena Maria a fab cake!
Ricardo repeated Fidencia’s instructions to Scott, who wrote it down like a reporter covering a news conference.
“Two layers?” he said, surveying the stack of cake pans. “Let’s make it four. One quince cake, coming up. Isabel, get me some flour, milk, sugar, eggs, lemons, crushed pineapple, butter, salt, baking powder, vanilla, aaaaaand…what else, what else?”
“An apron!” I said, tossing Enrique’s apron to him.
By the time I finished putting everything on the big prep table, Scott had rounded up the large electric mixer, spatulas, a timer, measuring cups and spoons, and a box of toothpicks. He was busy scribbling notes on a paper.
“Hmm. We’re expecting about a hundred people, wouldn’t you say, including the musicians? So, my recipe calculations tell me that for the cake I will need fifteen sticks of butter, fifteen cups of sugar, twenty cups of flour, twenty teaspoons of baking powder, two-and-a-half teaspoons of salt, two and a half dozen eggs—that’s thirty eggs, Isabel—seven-and-a-half cups of milk, and twenty teaspoons of vanilla. And for the frosting, another two-and-a-half cups of milk, six tablespoons of vanilla, seven-and-a-half tablespoons of lemon juice, two-and-a-half teaspoons of lemon zest, twenty-two-and-a-half cups of confectioners’ sugar, seven-and-a-half pounds of butter, and…are you ready?”
My eyes were bugging from the amounts he’d mentioned.
“Seven-and-a-half pounds of butter!” My mouth fell open, but Scott didn’t miss a beat. I was wondering if we were all going to have heart attacks from eating all that butter!
“You measure, I mix. Ricardo, preheat the oven.”
We got busy and scuttled around the kitchen to retrieve yet another utensil for Chef Scott. We taught him the Spanish words for the ingredients, and Ricardo answered his many questions about Los Mitotes and the cows. Jill and Lauren wandered in, but Scott shooed them out with a flick of his batter-encrusted spatula. When he heard Elena Maria’s voice in the hallway, he nearly went into over-drive.
“Out, out! Elena Maria, least of all, should be in here!” he cried. “Isabel, distract her!”
I dashed out the door and almost ran smack into my sister, who was wearing her dress for the party tomorrow. She gave me a funny look. Of course, there was flour in my hair, on my nose, on my clothes…it looked like I had taken a flour bath!
“Uh, hey, Izzy. What are you doing in there? I need a snack. I’ve been practicing my waltz steps in my room, and I’m famished.”
“Uhhh, you can’t go in there!” I said, stepping in front of her.
“Why not?” She crossed her arms.
“Because…because…” I looked around frantically, trying to come up with a good reason. Suddenly I realized it was standing right in front of me. “Because you’re wearing your quince dress!”
“So? I have to practice dancing in it to make sure I won’t trip or anything.”
“But the kitchen is a total mess. Look at me…flour everywhere. And Freckles is in there, and he would totally peck your dress to shreds!”
Elena’s eyes widened. “Oh, Isabel. You are absolutely right! I can’t believe I was about to walk in there in this. What am I thinking?” She shook her head. “This quince thing is making me a little loca, I think.” She gave me a quick kiss on the cheek.
No kidding, I wanted to say, but I didn’t, because Elena Maria was being so nice. “In fact, why don’t I just get Scott to bring some chips up to your room?” I suggested.
She broke into a grin. “Thanks, Iz. You know what? You’re such a sweet little sister after all.” She started to turn away, then stopped. “What’s Scott doing in there, anyway?”
I gave her a grin the size of Texas and said, “It’s a surprise. For you.”
“Oh!” She pursed her lips and flounced away down the hall. Avery would be so proud of me. My matchmaking skills had definitely improved.
“Phew!” I breathed a sigh of relief as I popped back into the kitchen. “That was close, Scott! I had to promise her you would bring some chips up to her room.”
“No problem,” he agreed. “Good work!”
The timers rang. Scott tested the cakes with a toothpick. When it emerged from the pan without a speck of batter, he pronounced them done. We waited for the cakes to cool while Scott made the pineapple-lemon filling. He gave me a taste and I drooled while he got to work cutting and reassembling the cakes.
“Voilà. My friends, this is what is known as the first tier.”
Scott quickly assembled the second tier, then moved onto the third and final tier. When he was done, he stepped back to admire his work.
“That looks incredible, Scott,” I said, clapping him on the back.
“Wow! Did I really do this?”
I nodded. “All you need is the buttercream frosting, and you’re done.”
“That kind of frosting works best when it’s nice and cold. We have to let the cakes thoroughly cool too. Here’s what I’ll do. I’ll make the frosting, let it sit overnight in the fridge, then put the final touches on it tomorrow morning. What do you think, Isabel?”
“Dude—you should have your own TV cooking show for sure. That was awesome!”
CHAPTER 14
Whodunit?
That was a close one,” I said to Ricardo as we stumbled out of the kitchen after spending almost an hour getting everything cleaned up. We were both completely wiped out from being Scott’s assistant chefs, on top of the earlier night’s adventures in the cave.
“Yeah. That guy Scott can really cook! Good thing he was here.”
“What’s going to happen with Fidencia and Enrique?” I asked as we headed toward Ricardo’s room to chill for a while. “That was so crazy, the way they just quit like that.”
“I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “I mean, I’ve seen them blow up before, but never�
��”
As we passed Uncle Hector’s office, we both heard him talking to someone on the phone. “So I need a whole order of your famous empanadas for tomorrow, if you can do it. Mmm-hmm. Yep, it’s been quite a week around here. First the thing with our housekeeper, and now my cooks walk out on us the day before my niece’s quinceañera!”
My eyes got huge. I grabbed Ricardo’s arm and dragged him into the stairwell before I turned around to talk to him. “The thing with our housekeeper? Ricardo, does that mean what I think it means?”
“Uhh…what do you think it means?”
“Ricardo!” I could tell he was just pretending he didn’t get it because he didn’t really want to get it. “That means they really do think that Mercedes broke the eagle!”
“How do you know?”
“Didn’t you just hear your dad? Come on!” Again I had to practically drag him up the stairs to the hallway that led to Mercedes’s room and my room. When we got to the top, we heard voices that were unmistakable. It was definitely Mercedes and Ricardo’s mom having a very passionate conversation in Mercedes’s room. I looked at Ricardo, he looked at me, and we immediately (and superquietly) dashed past Mercedes’s partially open door, slipped into my room, and shut the door.
“Is your mom firing Mercedes right now?” I practically shrieked.
“Shhhh!” Ricardo shushed me. “I don’t know!”
I looked wildly around the room until my eyes landed on the glass, cup-shaped candleholder on my little bedside table.
“Perfect!” I snatched up the glass and ran to the other side of the room, pressing the glass to the wall and my ear to the glass.
“What are they saying?” Ricardo asked immediately.
“Shhhh!” Now it was my turn to shush him. “I can barely hear, okay?”
We both held our breath. I listened carefully. They were speaking Spanish, so I had a little trouble figuring out what was going on at first, but then I heard something that sent chills down my spine.
“Doña Inez, perhaps it is fixable?” Mercedes said. “I could try and…”