Mrs. Scrooge

by Barbara Bretton

  "You've already made quite a profit. That kid of yours drives a hard bargain."

  "Like mother, like daughter," said Sam with a smile. "Condiments?"

  He leaned across the round table and told her exactly what she could do with her condiments in a way that made her laugh. "You sure you never heard of me? Three appearances on Letterman. A mention in Time and Newsweek—"

  "I believe you, Murphy, I believe you!"

  "U.S. News and World Report—"

  "Your credits are impressive but I still don't know who you are." She patted his forearm much the same way she often patted her daughter's. "Don't be hurt. I've been so busy the last few years I only found out last week that Bush is out of office."

  "Sorry," O'Rourke said. "I'm having trouble adjusting to the civilian life. Unless you're a news junkie, there's no reason for you to know who I am."

  "No apology needed."

  "I sounded like a jerk."

  "We all do sometimes."

  "Turkey and tuna."

  Sam blinked. "I beg your pardon?"

  "The sandwiches. Turkey and tuna. Rye and whole wheat. Plenty of cole slaw and garlic dills, if you have them."

  "You are one very strange man, O'Rourke." She grabbed the pen.back from him and wrote down his order. "Pretzels? Peanuts?"

  "We have a supplier."

  They went over how many trays she would prepare, refrigeration requirements, and delivery times.

  "You know your stuff," he said, a note of admiration in his voice. "If you can cook, I've got it made."

  "I'd better be able to cook," Sam said as she put the cap back on her pen and closed her notebook. "I intend to become rich doing it."

  "Ambitious?"

  Her jaw settled into its familiar granite line. "Extremely."

  He leaned back in his chair, fingers tapping against the arm. "Your daughter really is a lot like you."

  "I know," Sam said, pride welling up inside her chest. "She believes she can have anything she wants, as long as she works for it." And, considering Patty's intellectual gifts, the sky was the limit.

  "Do you believe the same thing?"

  Sam thought about the rose-covered cottage and gingham apron she'd once believed would be hers, then contrasted it to the life she had now. "I don't believe in setting limits on achievement."

  His expression was warm and friendly and gently mocking. "Make a hell of a ham sandwich, do you, Samantha?"

  "You better believe it!" Laughter, sudden and delighted, broke through her reserve. "The name's Sam, by the way."

  He extended his hand. "Murphy."

  They shook solemnly. Although she hated people who judged others by the force of a handshake, Sam couldn't help but note the assurance and strength in his grip.

  "How would you feel about manning the grill a few nights a week until I hire a new chef?"

  For a moment Sam was sorely tempted. "I love short-order cooking, but my schedule is packed between now and New Year's."

  "Christmas shopping?"

  "Business. I'm opening my shop on New Year's Day."

  He stared at her as if he'd seen a ghost. "No one opens a shop on New Year's Day. Everyone's home watching football and nursing champagne headaches."

  "New Year's Day," she repeated, voice firm. "Think of how many football parties I can cater."

  O'Rourke's grin faded. "What about your own party?"

  "I don't have one."

  "You go to a friend's house?"

  Sam shook her head. "About the sandwiches," she said, looking to change the subject. "Maybe we should—"

  "You have to go somewhere," O'Rourke persisted. "No one stays home on New Year's Eve."

  "You must have been one heck of a reporter. It's none of your business, O'Rourke, but Patty spends the night at her grandparents' house and I usually work."

  "I thought you were in cooking school or something."

  "Catering firms go crazy during the holidays. I can pick up a month's wages with a few days' work."

  The twinkle in his hazel eyes was replaced by a laser beam of unashamed curiosity. "You hate Christmas."

  "Don't be ridiculous!"

  "It's written all over your face."

  "That's fatigue."

  "What about Patty? Kids live for Christmas."

  "Don't worry about Patty. She does just fine at Christmastime."

  "You decorate a tree?"

  "Of course."

  "You put up lights at the window?"

  "Patty does."

  "Do you send Christmas cards?"

  "When I can afford the stamps."

  The glitter in his eyes returned. "And you hate every minute of it."

  Sam shoved her chair back and rose to her feet. "I'll drop off the sandwiches on my way to the train station tomorrow morning. Please have someone here to let me in. Seven-thirty, the latest." She turned to head for the door but he grabbed her wrist.

  "Hit a nerve, didn't I?"

  "I'm surprised you didn't recognize a closed door when you saw one."

  "I didn't get to be a foreign correspondent by letting doors stay closed."

  "Well, I have a news flash for you, O'Rourke—you're not a reporter anymore, you're a bartender in New Jersey and how I feel about Christmas is none of your business."

  His own chair scraped against the floor as he stood up and faced her. His rugged features had lost the edge of humor and it occurred to Sam that she was alone in a bar with a group of men she knew next to nothing about.

  "One question," he said, his voice gruff.

  She swallowed hard. "Just one then I'm out of here."

  "Does this mean you won't be making the sandwiches for us?"

  "With what you're willing to pay me? You must be joking," said Sam. "A deal's a deal."

  "You don't know how glad I am to hear you say that." O'Rourke broke into a crooked smile that was actually rather appealing, in an odd sort of way. "I'm glad Patty brought us together."

  "So am I," said Sam. "I think it be will profitable for both of us."

  "Yeah?" said O'Rourke as he walked her to the door. "I was thinking that it just might be fun."

  Chapter Four

  "Forget it," said Murphy when he turned around to face the gray inquisition after Sam said good-night. "She'll be cooking for us. Nothing more."

  "She's a fine looking woman," said Joe, helping himself to another pint of draft. "Not all painted up like the one you brought around last Christmas,"

  "I like them all painted up." Murphy flipped the sign to Closed and wondered when they'd take the hint.

  "She looks to be a woman of fine breeding," Scotty pronounced.

  "Don't go reading anything into it, Scotty. This is strictly business."

  "That was an exceptionally long business conversation, my boy. Certainly bar food does not require so intense a debate."

  Murphy stifled a yawn. "We had a lot to talk about."

  "Ham and cheese is that interesting?"

  "Get off my back, will you, Scotty?" Murphy's tone was good-natured but exasperated. "We were talking about her kid."

  "Acquiring a paternal instinct at this late date?"

  Murphy grabbed a bar rag and swabbed down the counter by the sink. "Patty's a genius."

  "All parents believe their offspring to be genius caliber."

  "This kid's the real thing, Scotty. Certifiably brilliant."

  "A child after my own heart." Scotty narrowed his eyes in thought. "What, may I ask, is she doing in a mediocre school like Harborfields?"

  "You were at Princeton too long, MacTavish. Not everyone can afford snot-nosed prep schools for their kids."

  "What does her father do for a living?" Scotty was of the old school and believed the male of the species should shoulder the greater portion of life's burdens.

  The question brought Murphy up short. "I don't know," he said after a moment.

  "Single mother?"

  "Divorced, I guess," said Murphy, although they hadn't touched on anythin
g quite that personal.

  "You didn't see fit to ask?"

  "It never came up."

  "This child," said Scotty, following Murphy back to the office where he kept the bar receipt books. "What was it about her that put you in mind of me?"

  Murphy sat on the edge of the metal desk. "Brain power, Scotty. The kid has it in spades. Would you believe I spent five minutes with her and ended up hiring her mother to cook for the bar?"

  Scotty's laugh filled the tiny office. "I'm seventy-two years old, my boy. I'd believe just about anything."

  Murphy gave him the condensed version of the business negotiations played out that afternoon.

  "A thirty percent markup at least," said Scotty. "Try thirty-five."

  "This child is a natural resource," Scotty declared. "No doubt she could alleviate the deficit in the blink of an eye."

  "She did a hell of a good job alleviating her mother's deficit."

  "Obviously Samantha is a marvelous cook."

  "I hope so," Murphy mumbled.

  "You hope so?" Scotty's eyes widened behind his glasses. "You haven't sampled her wares?"

  "I tried some cookies."

  "And . . . ?"

  "And nothing, Scotty. Christmas cookies. That's it."

  "And you've hired this woman to handle the care and feeding of your valued customers?"

  Murphy opened his mouth to speak but the retired professor was on a roll.

  "This tavern provides more than libation for a thirsty traveler, Murphy. It's a haven for the lonely, a home for the homeless, a—"

  "Give it a rest, will you, Scotty?" bellowed Murphy. "We're talking pizza and hamburgers here, not the salvation of the western world."

  "The younger generation," said Scotty with a shake of his head. "You don't understand the value of a neighborhood pub."

  Right again, Scotty. Murphy had spent his adult life running as far and fast from Rocky Hill as his ambition could carry him and the minute Bill O'Rourke was ready to take over again, he would be on the next plane out.

  * * *

  THE COMMENTATOR was announcing the start of the fourth quarter of the football game when Patty heard her mother's Blazer chugging up the driveway. She leaped from the couch and peered out the window through a crack in the venetian blinds.

  "Mom's home!"

  "Is she smiling?" asked Aunt Caroline.

  "I can't tell. She's up to her eyebrows in Shop-Rite bags."

  "Your mother is a sick woman." Caroline stifled a yawn. "We sit up half the night waiting for her to return from an assignation with a foreign correspondent and she ends up pushing a cart at the supermarket. I'm ready to give up on her, Patricia."

  The more Patty heard the name, the better she liked it. Why didn't it sound so wonderful when Mrs. Venturella called her Patricia? She pulled the drapes across the front window and curled up opposite Caroline. "She's whistling. That's a good sign:"

  "Knowing Sam, she might be whistling because she got a great deal on cauliflower."

  Patty couldn't argue that statement; the past few years, her mother had been more interested in business than anything else on earth except for Patty herself. But this time was different; Patty was certain of it. How could her mom meet someone as perfect as Murphy O'Rourke and walk away unimpressed?

  "Hi, Mom!" Patty trilled as Sam closed the front door behind her.

  "Hello to both of you," said Sam as Patty jumped up to help her mother with the parcels. "I didn't know you'd still be here, Caroline."

  Aunt Caroline had no time for small talk. "How long were you at the meeting?" she asked.

  Patty's breath caught in her throat.

  "Five minutes," said her mom.

  "You couldn't have spent just five minutes with him!" Murphy O'Rourke was exciting and smart and funny--everything that was just right for her mom. There was no way in the world they could have said everything that needed to be said in just three hundred seconds!

  "Five minutes at the meeting," her mom repeated, her expression neutral.

  Sam headed toward the kitchen with her parcels. Patty grabbed a bundle and followed after her mom, with Aunt Caroline close behind.

  "C'mon, Mom," urged Patty as the grocery bag split and spilled the produce on the counter top. "Don't tease me like that."

  "Patricia is right," said Caroline from the doorway. "She's too mature for such teasing."

  "Patricia?" Patty's mom put two grocery bags down on the counter near the sink. "When did that happen?"

  "Patricia is an elegant name, as befits this brilliant child," said Aunt Caroline in her loftiest manner.

  Sam looked back at Patty. "What do you think about it?"

  Patty shrugged, wishing the conversation would go back to what was really important: Murphy O'Rourke. "I like it. It makes me feel grown up."

  Groaning, Sam unpacked two rolls of toilet paper and some hand soap from the first bag. "Make yourself useful, friend." She pressed the items into Caroline's arms. "Stash these in the back bathroom."

  "Slave driver," muttered Caroline and disappeared down the dark hallway.

  Sam turned back to her packages. Patty was almost beside herself with excitement, as if her skin had turned itself inside out and all of her nerve endings were dangling in the breeze.

  "Do your homework?" Sam asked, her voice matter-of-fact.

  "Hours ago."

  "Did Caroline keep you from going to sleep?"

  Patty shook her head. "I was staying up to see you." From the way her mom's dark brows arched toward the ceiling, Patty knew she had made a strategic error. Time to retreat and regroup. She fiddled with a teaspoon resting alongside the stainless steel sink. "Did you meet Mr. O'Rourke?" she asked, as casually as she could manage.

  Her mom nodded.

  "Did you talk about the job?"

  "All that money for so little work—it should be against the law!" Her mom shook her head in amazement. "You cooked up quite a deal for me, Patty."

  Patty's spirits soared. "Did you like him?"

  "He's not very good at business. I like that in a man."

  "I think he's cute," said Patty, stepping out onto thin ice.

  "Cute?" Her mom laughed out loud. "The man dresses like a bum."

  Patty was highly insulted. Couldn't her mother see that Murphy O'Rourke was a free spirit? Free spirits didn't worry about three-piece suits and lace-up shoes. "I think he has style."

  "Honey, that trench coat was the worst."

  "It has character," Patty retorted. "Can you imagine, Mom, one time he left it on the Orient Express and they sent it back to him the very next day."

  "No doubt," said her mother in that I-am-the grownup tone of voice that Patty hated with all her heart. "The Orient Express has a reputation to consider."

  Caroline came back into the kitchen, her coat slung over her arm. "Did I hear something about the Orient Express?"

  Suddenly Patty didn't want to talk about Murphy O'Rourke any more: Her Aunt Caroline had a string of boyfriends, one ex-husband, and at least a dozen lovestruck suitors hoping for a chance to win her heart, and Patty would bet dollars to donuts that Caroline wasn't about to surrender her heart to any of them. She loved her godmother, but Caroline had a funny way of looking at men, almost as if they were windup toys and not real people.

  Her mom didn't think like that, and Patty couldn't imagine Murphy O'Rourke being bossed around by anybody.

  Patty raised up on tiptoe and peered into the grocery bag atop the microwave. "Three jars of dill pickles?" she asked, looking to change the subject.

  Her mom grinned and removed a bread knife from the drawer near the sink. "Your Mr. O'Rourke requested them."

  Was Patty just tired or were her mother's dark eyes sparkling with fun?

  "Business, business, business," muttered Caroline, slipping into her coat. "I give up on you."

  "Good," said Sam, slicing into a loaf of rye.

  Good, thought Patty. This wasn't the time for Caroline to bring up the Christmas masq
uerade ball. Her mother could be real stubborn when she thought she was being tricked into doing something she didn't want to do. Grandpa Harry always said that Sam would rather be boiled in oil than be forced to change her mind.

  "I'll pick you up at seven," Caroline said, hugging Patty then heading toward the back door.

  "Seven!" Sam looked positively panicked. "Isn't that late?"

  Caroline paused in the doorway. "Didn't I tell you? I'm driving in tomorrow morning. I have a stack of Carolina Herrera gowns to pick up from Old Frosty on East Sixty-Third Street." Old Frosty was a society wife whose idea of fun was buying expensive designer dresses and never wearing them. Half of Aunt Caroline's stock was courtesy of Old Frosty. In fact, there were an awful lot of ladies like her who seemed to shop for a living. Patty couldn't understand it because there was nothing in the world she hated more than being dragged into Macy's at Quakerbridge and forced to try on new clothes for her mom. Why anyone would think all that dressing and undressing was fun was beyond her.

  Grownups could be very weird sometimes.

  Her mom and Caroline talked for a few minutes, trying to arrange their schedule, then Caroline decided it wouldn't hurt to get a later start. She'd pick up Sam and her sandwiches, then ferry them over to O'Rourke's Bar and Grill at seven-thirty. "Old Frosty can wait," Caroline said with a laugh as she wound her scarf around her throat. "I want to get myself a look at Patty's—"

  Patty faked a sneeze and sent a glass tumbling off the tabletop and crashing to the floor. Anything to keep Caroline quiet! Her aunt was about to say "dream man," she just knew it. If her mom got so much as the slightest hint of matchmaking—well, Patty couldn't bear to think about what would happen.

  Patty didn't take another easy breath until Aunt Caroline waved goodbye and hurried outside to her car.

  "Don't you think you should go to sleep now?" asked Sam after the car disappeared down the street. "It's after eleven."

  "I want to see the Giant's win."

  "Why is it I have the feeling you haven't paid one second's worth of attention to the game all night?"