by Unknown
Mitch wondered if he had ever heard someone deliver such a sweeping denunciation of another human being.
“We should really tell Jim that dinner’s ready,” she said now, glancing over in the direction of his little wood-framed cottage, where lights were on. “He can seem a little scary, but he’s been a good, good friend to Father.”
Mitch began to hear music as they made their way to Jim’s cottage—an old sixties San Francisco band, Quicksilver Messenger Service. Mitch had always admired the soaring, quivering licks of Quicksilver’s lead guitarist, John Cipollina. He’d never been able to duplicate the sound on his Stratocaster.
“How come Jim was in prison?” he asked Moose.
She rapped on the crusty Vietnam vet’s door with her knuckles. Inside, the music went silent. “You can ask him. He doesn’t mind talking about it.”
“Talking about what, girl?” Jim wondered as he pulled open the door, wearing an aged Pendleton plaid wool shirt over a tie-dyed T-shirt. A strong scent of marijuana came wafting out of the cottage along with him.
“Mitch wondered why they sent you to prison,” Moose said to him.
“Son, I’m a big bad drug trafficker,” Jim answered as the three of them started toward the house together. “Or so the law says. I say otherwise. Had me my own place over on the other side of those trees. Sixty good acres that had been in my family since forever. I was working that land and minding my own business.”
“Jim raised organic produce for the local health-food stores,” Moose said. “Lettuce, spinach, strawberries . . . All of it wonderful.”
“So why did they come after you?”
“I raised me another crop, too,” Jim replied. “The demon weed, son. Not for profit. Nothing like that. I grew it for my friends with cancer who were on chemo and sick to their stomachs night and day. I grew it for the older people who’ve got the arthritis so bad they can’t get out of bed in the morning. It was medicine for them. I gave it to ’em for free.”
“Some might even say he was an angel of mercy,” Moose said.
“Don’t know if I’d go that far,” Jim said. “I did smoke me a lot of it, too. But, hell, I was doing some good. And it’s legal to use it for medical purposes in this state. Just ain’t legal to grow it. Someone ratted me out to the law. Got me a pretty fair idea who, too. And they said my farm was being used in the commission of a drug crime and therefore could be seized. They took my family’s land away from me, son. Put me on the shelf for three years. I’m still on parole. And if Hangtown hadn’t given me a place to stay, I’d be living out of a cardboard box under an overpass.”
“What’s happened to your farm?” Mitch asked.
“Some Canadian real estate syndicate bought it,” he replied hoarsely. “Tore the house right down. Been in my family a hundred sixty years and they level it like a paper cup. Now the land’s just sitting there waiting for something bad to happen. And Bruce Leanse’s fingerprints are all over it.”
“You can’t prove that, Jim,” Moose pointed out. From her tone, Mitch gathered that Jim had voiced his theory before.
“I know what I know,” Jim said stubbornly. “He was the one making me all of those offers. He wanted my place, and he got it.”
“What do you think he intends to do with it?” Mitch asked.
“Ask Takai,” Jim said harshly.
“She’s the Brat’s realtor?”
Jim let out a laugh. “ ‘Enabler’ is more like it. She’s as slick as owl poop, too. But I know it was her ratted me out to the law. And if the day ever comes when I can prove it . . . Trust me, son, blood will get shed.”
“Jim, I wish you wouldn’t talk that way,” Moose said to him crossly.
“It’s the truth, girl. Can’t help it if it ain’t pretty.”
They went back inside the house through the mudroom door. After exchanging her mud clogs for wool ones, Moose returned to the kitchen.
Jim tugged off his own muddy work boots and changed into Indian moccasins. Then he set to work washing his veiny hands in the mudroom’s work sink. “Meantime, son,” he said, a malevolent grin creasing his leathery face, “I know how to get even with Brucie.”
“How?” asked Mitch, wondering if this particular swamp Yankee had smoked a bit too much of his own medicine.
“Next spring, soon as it gets good and warm, I’ll plant me some dope plants on his place up on the hill. Deep in the woods, where he can’t find ’em. Serve that bastard right.” Jim reached for a towel to dry his hands, his expression turning serious. “Whatever you do, son, stay away from Takai. She’s pure evil.”
She was in the kitchen now, sipping a glass of wine and looking exceptionally gorgeous in an artfully unbuttoned cashmere cardigan, skintight leather miniskirt and spiked heels. Takai’s legs were long, shapely and golden. She smelled of a musky perfume that was positively intoxicating.
“It’s like I found out a long time ago,” Jim added in a low voice. “Nothing that looks like that can possibly be good for you.”
“What’s that you’re saying, Jim?” Takai demanded.
“Just saying how good you look, baby.”
“Nice to see you again, Mitch,” she said, her eyes gleaming at him. “I have this damned business meeting to go to tonight, so I won’t be able to stick around for long. I apologize in advance.”
“Absolutely no need to,” said Mitch, who was starting to feel a bit light-headed. It was that perfume of hers.
Dinner was a roasted leg of lamb studded with garlic and rosemary, mashed potatoes and sautéed greens that Moose had harvested from the garden. All of it was superb. They ate in the low-ceilinged dining room, a very old room with exposed chestnut beams and a walk-in fireplace with a beehive oven and cast-iron crane. A big fire of massive oak logs roared in the fireplace, bathing the room in warmth and golden light. A highly precious handful of landscape paintings by Hangtown’s father and grandfather adorned the walls, all of them paintings of this very farm. Hangtown sat at one end of the scarred oak dining table, his back to the fire and Sam at his feet. Mitch, the guest of honor, faced the fire.
“Used to do all of their cooking in that fireplace,” Hang-town informed Mitch as they ate. “There was a spit with a clock-jack to turn it. House belonged to a clergyman then. There mm-rr-were a whole lot of clergymen in Grandmother’s family. Distinguished theologians and scholars.” He paused to sip his wine. “Obsessive foot fetishists, one and all. Inveterate toe suckers.”
“Father!” objected Moose. “What has gotten into you tonight?”
“It’s Big Mitch,” Hangtown responded, his blue eyes twinkling devilishly. “He’s a baad influence.”
“Mitch is behaving like a perfect gentleman,” Takai sniffed, gazing at him invitingly. Her eyes promised him unimaginable erotic riches. Strictly an act. Mitch knew a performance when he saw one. “Too perfect, if you ask me.”
“Well, he cheers me up,” Hangtown declared. “Nice to have a healthy young goat around here for a change.” He pointed a wavering finger at Moose. “What’s this I hear about Colin Falconer swallowing a bottle of pills today?”
“I was there,” she affirmed somberly. “He would have died if the resident trooper hadn’t gotten to him in time. Poor Colin’s just caught in this awful school-bond snare. For his sake, I hope he resigns. He’s a good, kind man.”
“He’s a wimp,” Hangtown shot back. “Never punish yourself—punish the other guy.”
“Besides, pills are the coward’s way out,” Jim added, nodding.
“I suppose if he were a manly man he would have blown his head off,” Moose said sharply.
“What Colin needs to accept,” Takai interjected, “is that there are a lot of people in Dorset who simply won’t rest until he’s out. They want their new school. And they want a superintendent who recognizes that we need it.”
“Like hell we do, princess,” Hangtown grumbled. “Fix the old one if it needs fixing. Fit it and shut up about it.”
“A fine ne
w school will be a credit to our community,” Takai said.
“It will kill our community,” he argued. “Our property taxes will be doubled. The old folks on fixed incomes will be driven out. The working folks will be driven out. The only people who’ll be able to afford to live in Dorset anymore are the yuppie scum with their fat six-figure incomes and their fat, snot-nosed brats!”
Takai drained her wine, patting her lips with her napkin. “Nonsense, Father. It’s a very good deal for the town. Bruce is offering to donate that land on Old Ferry Road. And Babette’s waiving her fee. She’ll design it for nothing.”
“In exchange for what?” Jim demanded. “People like them don’t do anything for nothing.”
“Bruce Leanse is a man of integrity,” she responded, tossing her head. Her glossy black hair gleamed in the firelight, as if she were lit from within. “And he’s bending over backward to do the right thing. I think he should be given credit for it, not vilified.”
Jim lit a Lucky Strike and passed the pack over to Hang-town, who did the same despite Moose’s disapproving look. “And when the dust settles,” Jim said, drawing the smoke deep into his lungs, “he’ll have brung a town road, power and phone lines into what used to be nothing but farmland and old-growth forest. That school’s his damned Trojan horse, can’t you see that, girl? We’ll have sewers here before we know it. And town-house condos. And then this won’t be Dorset no more.”
“Jim, you’re a paranoid lunatic,” Takai said flatly.
“I know what I know,” Jim insisted, glowering across the table at her. “Too many places in this valley are getting gobbled up all of a sudden. Big chunks of acreage, too.”
“Not this chunk,” Hangtown roared, pounding the table with his fist. “That bastard will never get his hands on my place.”
“Look at a map sometime,” Jim said. “Connect the dots—the school site, my place, them others . . . You’ll see just how nuts I am.” He turned his squinty gaze on Mitch. “You’re the journalist, son. Ought to write about it. Tell the people what’s going on here.”
Mitch shot a glance over at Hangtown, whose face had immediately turned to stone, his bright-blue eyes icy and unyielding. “I’m not that kind of a journalist,” Mitch said carefully. “Besides, I’m not even sure I see a story here.”
“Then maybe you ought to try opening your eyes,” Jim growled at him.
“Leave him alone, Jim,” said Moose, rushing to Mitch’s defense.
“Well, I think we should be flattered that Bruce Leanse has taken an interest in Dorset,” Takai said, glancing at the Rolex on her slim wrist. “He believes in environmentally sensitive growth. He believes in preserving an area’s tradition. Whether you know it or not, he’s our best hope for the future.”
“Our best hope for the future is that he gets cancer,” Hangtown snarled.
“You’re wrong about him, Father,” she said, angry red splotches forming on her chiseled cheeks. “He’s not Satan.”
“He’ll do,” cackled Hangtown, who clearly relished these sparring sessions with his younger daughter.
His older daughter did not seem to be enjoying it at all. Moose’s eyes were cast down at her empty plate, her hands folded in her lap.
“This is the price you pay for living in paradise,” Takai said emphatically. “Other people want in, too.”
“In which case it’s not paradise anymore,” Hangtown said. “We never learn. We destroyed southern California. We destroyed Florida. We destroyed Long Island—”
“Wait, I have to take issue with you there,” Mitch interrupted. “Long Island was never nice.”
“It’s enough to make one wish for a nationwide economic calamity,” Hangtown argued. “People need to simplify their lives. Spend less. Consume less. We are pigs.”
“I’m going to have to take issue with you again—on behalf of Elrod,” Mitch said. “He seems like a very efficient fellow who’s doing no harm to anyone.”
“I like this man,” Hangtown said to Moose, as Jim refilled the wineglasses. “You ought to marry him.”
“You are the pig, Father,” Takai spoke up angrily. “You get to live here in luxuriant splendor but no one else can. That’s not a community—that’s a country club with a ceiling on its membership.”
“I just want to be left in peace. Don’t I have that right?”
“Not if it means denying other people their rights!”
Hangtown sat there in heavy silence for a moment, the fire crackling behind him. “You’ve been blinded by your own greed, princess. You think Bruce Leanse will line your pockets with gold, and you don’t care who or what gets destroyed.”
“You’re wrong, Father. He’s a good, good man.”
He leered at her. “Well, you ought to know just how good he is.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Father, please,” Moose interjected, glancing uncomfortably at Mitch, who was sitting there wondering if Hangtown was always so hard on Takai. “This is getting a little out of hand.”
The old man ignored her, glaring across the table at Takai. “Shall I tell you what your problem is?”
“What is it?” she demanded hotly, glowering right back at him. “I’d really love to know.”
“You inherited the Frye artistic vision but none of our talent. So you have to feed on real people in order to express yourself. You’re a leech, my dear. A lovely, silken parasite.”
“Th-that . . .” Takai was practically speechless, nothing but bottled-up fury. “That was an awful thing to say to anyone.” She got up suddenly, toppling her chair over behind her, and threw her wine in her father’s face. Then she stormed out, her spiked heels clacking, her hips swinging.
The dinner table fell silent as Mitch heard the front door slam, then the roar of the Porsche’s engine. It pulled away in a splatter of gravel.
“Hot damn!” the great Wendell Frye exclaimed happily, using his napkin to dab at the wine that was streaming down his face and neck. “Another quiet evening at the Ponderosa. More lamb, Big Mitch?”
• • •
“I thought I’d make dinner for Bella here on Friday,” Des said drowsily as she kneaded his chest with her bare toes. The two of them were lolling in Mitch’s claw-footed bathtub together, still aglow from the atomic passion they’d just detonated upstairs in the sleeping loft. “I had hoped to be in my new place by now, but . . .”
“Not a problem,” Mitch murmured contentedly, stroking her smooth, taut calf. “That’s fine. Wonderful . . .”
With the bathroom door open they could see the fire in the fireplace and hear the vintage Doug Sahm on the stereo—Sir Doug’s old San Antonio recordings with The Pharaohs. Both Clemmie and Quirt were balanced precariously on the edge of the tub, transfixed by the plopping, shifting water below. Quirt even dangled a paw down toward it, only to yank it back when Des playfully flicked water at him. It was strange how Quirt would only hang around in the house when Des was there, Mitch reflected. Even Clemmie seemed happier.
“There’s somebody else I’d like to invite,” she told him. “One of my . . . that is to say, a certain individual with whom I’m related is having a personal occasion.”
Mitch eyed her curiously. Whenever she retreated into police-speak it meant she was ill at ease. “What kind of a personal occasion?”
“A birthday.”
“And which particular relative would we be discussing, Master Sergeant?”
“Um, it’s my father. And we have this tradition where I make Hoppin’ John for him every year on his birthday. That’s black-eyed peas and ham and—”
“Whoa . . .”
“Rice, with lots and lots of Tabasco sauce. I usually make cornbread to sop it all up and—”
“Whoa! Pull over a second, girlfriend. We’re not exactly talking about what we’re talking about, are we?”
Des frowned at him. “Which is what?”
“That you just said you want me to meet your father.”
She fell silent a moment, shifting uneasily in the tub. “Well, yeah. Unless you don’t want to, which I would certainly . . . Man, why are you grinning at me that way?”
“I’m kvelling.”
“What does that mean—kvelling?”
“It’s what your Jewish people do in lieu of an end-zone celebration. It means I’m tremendously pleased. But tell me, who am I supposed to be? A friend? An acquaintance? A portly, somewhat pink person you bumped into at the supermarket?”
“Okay, that’s a fair question.”
“And . . .?”
“And it’s none of his damned business.”
“Hey, this sounds promising.”
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter. He’ll know what’s going on between us the second he walks through the door.”
“How?”
“He’s the Deacon, that’s how. You think you can read me. Compared to you, he’s Evelyn Wood. Besides which, I’m not a very good actress.”
“I can’t tell you how glad I am to hear that,” Mitch said.
“Why’s that?”
“Because it means you weren’t faking just now when we were upstairs.”
“Boyfriend, nobody’s that good an actress,” she said softly, her eyes shining at him.
Mitch had not known whether to expect Des when he got home from Hangtown’s or not. Happily, he’d found her cruiser parked outside his cottage. And the lady herself parked on a stool at her easel, glasses sliding down her nose as she pondered an arrangement of empty bottles that she’d positioned on the floor at her feet. She’d stripped down to a halter top and gym shorts. And for Mitch there was something about the sight of her peerless caboose perched there on that stool that . . . well, within sixty seconds they were out of their clothes and up in his sleeping loft together.
It was so different than it had been like with Maisie. Within two weeks, he and Maisie had moved in together. Des was much more guarded and careful. In many ways, she was exactly like one of her feral cats. One moment she would inch toward his outstretched hand, purring. The next moment she would hiss and dart away. She was the most skittish woman he had ever known. Also the most alluring. Sometimes, he felt he knew exactly what she was thinking. Other times she totally befuddled him. For sure, she was not the sort of woman who he ever thought he’d find himself involved with. It was not the racial thing—which was not a thing at all as far as he was concerned. It was that she was a goddamned state trooper. And big into rules. She refused to keep any of her clothes at his place—always carting them to and fro in a gym bag. Refused to stay in his New York apartment, which she felt was Maisie’s place. More than anything, Mitch felt, she was afraid of getting in too deep. Possibly this was the baggage she’d brought along from her divorce. Possibly this was because the two of them were so different. He didn’t know. He only knew that she was beautiful and smart and honest, and the thought of her got him through each day.