He didn’t deny it, because she was right—that’s exactly what he’d done. There was nothing left for him to do here now but leave. Because he still wasn’t sure what to believe. He didn’t know if she was a sincere wack-job who really believed she spoke to ghosts or a con artist. He wanted to believe her but he didn’t.
“I’m sorry,” he finally said.
“Bye.”
She didn’t see him to the door.
The tears caught Mimi off guard. For the love of God, she was weeping over a guy she barely knew when she hadn’t shed tears for guys she’d dated for weeks. Certainly not the hot-air balloonist who’d donated half the genetic material to the baby who’d never be born…That must be it. This must be some sort of estrogen echo left over from her pregnancy, because this was not her usual behavior.
It didn’t matter. She wept like a sixteen-year-old girl who got dumped the day before prom. She was still crying when someone knocked at the door five minutes later. She bounded to her feet, dashing the tears from her face, envisioning Joe Tierney kneeling outside, begging for her forgiveness and realized she was heading into emotional territory she’d never visited before. It didn’t stop her from jerking open the door.
Jennifer Beesing stood outside in her housecoat, fluffy slippers on her feet, a china plate filled with pecan patties clutched between her hands. Pecan patties, Mimi knew, took an hour to make. Which meant Jennifer must have started them the minute she spied Mimi in the hall with Joe. It was as if Joe’s leaving had been predestined.
Jennifer held out the plate, her doleful expression welcoming Mimi into the fold of those whose romances are doomed to fail.
“I made pecan patties,” she said.
Chapter Twenty-two
Prescott popped open the Prius’s hatchback and pulled the Sam’s Club carton toward him, tallying the number of Kleenex boxes he’d bought. Twenty. Should be enough for the week. The shots from the allergist were finally beginning to show effects. Of course, the same allergist had also advised Prescott not to share quarters with any fur-bearing creature. As far as Prescott was concerned, that wasn’t an option.
He’d told Mrs. Olson he would take Bill (he’d picked the name from The Lord of the Rings, hoping for the same sort of loyalty Sam’s pony had shown him on the road to Mordor), and he wasn’t going back on his promise. Without Bill, Prescott didn’t have any excuse to contact Mimi Olson, to send her pictures, to write her notes about Bill’s care and progress. His diligence had been rewarded. Every now and then she had found time amongst her many obligations to write back. Last week, she’d written four full paragraphs.
Prescott jerked the carton toward him. Besides Kleenex, it held groceries and a dozen fully digestible dog chews in various sizes and shapes. He swung the heavy carton to his shoulder and grappled one-handed to close the hatchback.
He could tell he was losing weight, maybe even getting some muscles. He’d discovered that dog ownership entailed long daily walks, because a dog filled with pent-up energy is a destructive dog. Several chairs and tables had fallen victim to this object lesson before Prescott had tumbled to it.
He didn’t mind. Since the weather had turned cold and snow covered the ground, killing off many of the allergens afflicting him, he actually looked forward to their walks. In fact, as he’d anticipated, dog cohabitation (he decided he was morally opposed to the concept of owning another living being) had totally enriched his life. He liked being greeted whenever he entered a room, even a bathroom. He got a contact high from the mindless rapture a dog could find in an empty plastic water bottle. The weight of a dog’s warm body draped over his legs like a bean bag filled him with contentment. He enjoyed taking care of a dog, the feeling that someone depended on him not only for the basic necessities, but to fulfill a deep inner need to be part of a pack. He enjoyed it so much he’d decided to add to his enjoyment.
At the door, he set the dog food down and searched in his coat pockets for the keys. The workmen he’d hired to put in an in-ground pool had disabled the security system. He didn’t expect to use it much himself, but during the first week he and Bill had cohabited, many times when they went on their little walks, Bill went for swims and afterward the little guy stank of fish. Prescott did not like the fragrance, but Bill loved to swim, ergo the pool.
With the unexpectedly early arrival of winter, the crew had been forced to quit and had neglected to reconnect the system. Prescott didn’t care; he didn’t need it anymore. On cue, frantic barks and yaps from inside announced that his arrival had been noted.
“Just a minute! I’m coming!” he called, fumbling the keys. He grinned at the howl of canine protest in answer to what must have seemed like a cruel tease. As soon as he dumped this stuff in the kitchen, they’d go for a walk. They’d go east, following the footpath through the woods to the Chez Ducky compound, deserted now, as quaint and seedy and slumberous as the backmost shelf in a secondhand bookstore.
He pushed the door open. Three dogs blasted past him into the yard, barking and jumping and tumbling over one another. Three. He’d tripled his enjoyment of his new life as a rural iconoclast.
“Okay, okay! Just let me get this stuff inside.” He picked up the carton.
They wiggled, bounded, darted, and, realizing he had something that smelled really good in the cardboard carton, created a log jam at the entrance in their haste to be first back inside. His family was growing.
Chapter Twenty-three
On the flat-paneled plasma screen hanging on the hotel’s beige wall, Joan Wilder slipped over the muddy edge of a precipice and careened down the Peruvian rain forest’s soggy hillside. She plummeted into a mosquito-infested pool and disappeared beneath its surface.
Joe, sitting in the middle of the hotel’s king-sized bed, plumped the pillow behind his back and turned up the volume. As a veteran of thousands of “Free HBO!” hours in hundreds of extended-stay hotel suites, he’d seen Romancing the Stone at least five times. But as he’d been surfing through the channels he’d caught sight of the familiar mudslide scene (which invariably made his skin crawl) and put down the remote. Because something about the scene reminded him of something…or someone.
As soon as Joan erupted out of the stagnant pool of water, her hair streaming with muck, he realized who: Mimi Olson.
Except Joan Wilder looked confused, and then when Jack landed in her crotch, shocked, and finally surprised into laughter.
Mimi had looked…like Mimi. Comfortable in mud. Unshockable. And there’d be no need to surprise Mimi into laughter, because she’d already be laughing. Joan was vague, with an air of naïveté. Mimi was matter-of-fact, and if she was naive about anything, he’d have a hard time figuring out what that could be. Maybe that’s why the whole ghost-talking thing seemed so out of place….
Once again, it occurred to Joe that he spent too much time analyzing Mimi Olson. It had been almost a week since the Werners’ anniversary party and he still kept seeing the expression on her face when she realized he was all but accusing her of conning Prescott. Of course, if she was conning Prescott, what was she going to say, “Gee whiz, busted. My bad. Want more crackers?”
No, she would react exactly like she had reacted, with insulted dignity and cold indignation. Which is also exactly how she’d react if she was innocent.
But which one was she?
There was one way he could find out. He could call Prescott and check up on her story. It was not a new idea. He’d toyed with it ever since leaving her apartment, but something held him back. As irrational as he knew it to be, he suspected he felt some misplaced sense of owing her his confidence because he’d hurt her feelings. This was such dopey reasoning that he wondered whether he was having some sort of midlife crisis. But in that case he’d be lusting after a cheerleader, not a slightly frumpy middle-aged Petra Pan. Not that he was exactly lusting after her. Not exactly. She simply…interested him as a type he’d rarely, if ever, encountered.
So, as the days passed, nondopey reasoni
ng reasserted itself. If he had misjudged her, it was certainly understandable given the circumstances. And if it was only himself he was concerned was being taken for a ride, hell, he’d still be in the damn car. She was that appealing. But it wasn’t; it was Prescott, and he’d be damned if he’d apologize for being concerned for his son’s welfare. When you came right down to it, he didn’t owe Mimi anything; he did owe Prescott.
In fact, he still owed it to Prescott to find out exactly what sort of relationship he and Mimi had. Sure, part of his desire to discover whether she’d told him the truth or a lie had a personal basis, but he was pretty damn sure it wasn’t the greater part. He’d probably already been negligent by letting the questions he had about Mimi stew as long as they had.
He clicked the MUTE button on the remote and reached for his cell phone, scrolling to Prescott’s number. He hit the SEND button and waited. On the television, Jane Wilder arrived at a cantina wrapped in a Mexican shawl and wowed Jack. Mimi wouldn’t have bothered with the shawl and still would have wowed Jack. It was all a matter of attitude. And any woman who could carry off a starfish-bedecked terry beach robe could carry off damn near anything.
“Hello?” Prescott’s voice answered on the fifth ring. He sounded guarded.
“Hello, Prescott. This is J—This is your dad.”
A pause. “Yes?”
“I’ll be leaving Minneapolis in a few days and I thought I’d, ah, give you a call before I took off.”
Prescott didn’t reply.
“I’m heading for Hong Kong.”
“Oh,” Prescott said. Then, “Why are you telling me that?”
“Why?”
“You’ve, ah, never told me your itinerary before. Why now?”
“I don’t know. I thought you might be interested. They love Pi—table tennis in China. Do they have any, like, special paddles over there you’d like me to get you?”
Prescott sighed. “I’m not a little kid, Joe. You don’t have to bring me presents from your trips abroad.”
“I know. But when you were a kid, I never seemed to get a decent present for you, and now, I don’t know…” Why did he have to explain something as simple as wanting to pick up a gift for his own son to his own son? “I guess I thought I might finally get you something you’d actually like. Instead of something stupid.”
Another pause. “I thought you were mocking me with the pet rock. Until I found out all the kids at public school had them. I’m sorry I threw it through the window.”
“Forget it. It was stupid.”
“No. You made an effort.”
Wow. Prescott had never expressed any appreciation for Joe’s intentions before, however far they fell from the mark. This was going better than he’d expected.
“It must have been like buying the kibble brand your vet recommends for your dog only to discover he hates it.”
Huh? Was this empathy? Oh, that’s right, Prescott had a dog. The dog Mimi had given him. A perfect opening. “That’s right. I ran into Mimi Olson at a function I was attending here in Minneapolis last week. She said you were taking care of a dog.”
This time the short silence was much more attentive. “You saw Mignonette Olson at some function? What function?”
“A party for some business associates.”
“Mignonette Olson works for a company your company is interested in?” Prescott sounded incredulous.
“No. She’s related to the owner of the business my company wants to buy.”
“She is?” Prescott asked. “Huh. I didn’t think the Olsons were that well off. I mean, they don’t seem to have much…Oh. Wait. That is cool! You mean they choose to stay in those huts? On purpose? Like domicile vegans or something? That is—”
“No,” Joe broke in before Prescott could wax even more poetic. “The Olsons are her father’s family. She’s related to this guy I’m working with through her mother’s side.”
“But she’s not an engineer or a tax lawyer or an accountant or does anything like you?” Prescott didn’t wait for an answer. He snorted. “Of course not.”
“Nope,” Joe confirmed. “Do you know what she does do? For a living?”
“No. But I wouldn’t be surprised if she was a nurse or a teacher. Maybe a kindergarten teacher. Why?”
Joe almost broke out laughing. Luckily, he didn’t. “You don’t happen to have her phone number, do you? Or know of any way I might reach her?”
“Why?” Prescott asked again. His voice had grown distinctly chilly. He was too old for this Oedipal crap. Even if his interest in Mimi had been a romantic one, he wouldn’t act on it. She was too far off in left field. Hell, if she really thought she talked to spooks, she might not even be playing in the same ballpark.
“Look, Pres,” Joe said tiredly. “I’m not interested in dating Mimi Olson. She lent me twenty bucks for a taxi. You know how I hate carrying cash. I’d like to return it to her.”
“Oh.” He bought it. “Well, I don’t have her number,” he said; then, his voice sharpening a little, “Why didn’t you just call this relative of hers?”
“Oh!” Joe said, not having to feign his pleasure. Mimi hadn’t been lying. “That’s a great idea. Why didn’t I think of that? Thanks, Prescott.”
“Sure,” Prescott said doubtfully.
“So, I’ll see if I can find you the latest thing in Ping-Pong paddles, okay?”
“It’s called table tennis,” Prescott said and hung up.
For a few seconds, he and Prescott had had something like a conversation going there. Maybe there was hope here after all. He set down the phone, feeling pleased. Prescott and he had been talking more or less amiably; his son was not being readied for a severe plucking; Mimi had been telling the truth. Wherever she’d gotten the wherewithal to purchase that necklace—or whatever admirer had given it to her—Prescott hadn’t been involved. Joe supposed that meant he owed Mimi an apology.
Wait. No, he didn’t. He’d done what any self-respecting father does who thinks he sees his son being ripped off; he’d spoken up. It would have been easier, not to mention a lot more satisfying, to have kept his mouth shut and forgotten his suspicions and let nature run its course that night. God knows, he’d wanted to. But he hadn’t and now he was glad he hadn’t.
He just wished he’d gone about the thing with a bit more subtlety and a lot more composure. It was unlike him to be precipitous and accusatory.
And he had been accusatory.
Fraud or not, he owed her an apology, if not for his suspicions, then for his manner. He considered calling her but decided against it. He still didn’t know what to make of her. Just because she hadn’t ripped off Prescott didn’t mean she hadn’t ripped off others. In fact, that’s what she did. For a living. Come on, Joe, he told himself, she works as a medium on a spiritualist hotline. Which was pretty much the textbook definition of a scam.
No. He’d acted impulsively enough where Mimi Olson was concerned. He’d send her some flowers, get rid of his guilt, and that would be the end of it.
Now, if he could just stop wishing it wouldn’t be.
Chapter Twenty-four
December
“So, if a minority of the heirs wanted to keep the land, they’d still have to buy out those who wanted to sell?” Mimi spoke into the little wand dangling in front of her mouth. Ozzie had lately sprung for new headsets.
“That’s the sum of it, Mignonette. And vice versa. But first, the property would have to be assessed,” the lawyer, Bud Butter, answered. “Could you excuse me for a minute?”
As she wasn’t paying him for his minutes—he was answering her questions as a favor to his best client, Tom Werner—she couldn’t very well say no. “Sure.”
Mimi shuffled through the papers on her desk while she waited, hunting for the piece of paper where she’d doodled the information Vida had given her. Vida, still trying to make amends for the “pathetic” comment, was relaying to Mimi as much intelligence about Debbie’s activities as she could ferret out
. Which would have been great if Mimi had known what to do with this information but instead only served to forcibly remind Mimi why she didn’t like information: it made you crazy. It was like watching an avalanche charging down the mountainside. There was nothing she could do to stop it, but now, thanks to Vida, she would spend her last minutes staring over her shoulder in horror rather than in blissful ignorance. She thought maybe Vida and her information were giving her an ulcer.
Yet, she couldn’t bring herself to tell Vida not to bother reporting on Debbie’s nefarious actions. So, here she was on the phone with Tom’s lawyer, asking questions as if she was formulating a plan. She wasn’t. Not really. She was simply…figuring out what someone else could do if they wanted to.
A few days ago, Vida had called up to tell her that Debbie was petitioning Oxlip County to rezone the land around Fowl Lake so she could sell it to a townhouse developer and that she and Bill had managed to talk Naomi into “providing for the little Olsons’ academic future” by voting to sell the Chez. From a couple text messages Birgie had sent on the cell phone—and why would Birgie suddenly be sending her text messages, for God’s sake?—Mimi knew Johanna was crumbling under the weight of her heirs’ expectations—or rather, their lack of them—too.
From what Bud Butter had said, Mimi realized it didn’t matter. They either all said yes to keeping Chez Ducky, or the place went up for sale. Unless someone or some ones could buy out the share of the person who wanted to sell.
“Sorry to keep you waiting.” Bud had returned. “Where was I?”
“How you determine the value of the property.”
“Oh, yes. Generally the executor hires an independent assessor. In this case, who is acting as executor?”
“Birgie,” Mimi said. This was a point in favor of those who’d just as soon stall this whole selling process. Birgie wouldn’t hire anyone without tons of pushing and prodding. However, something told Mimi that as soon as Debbie recognized this obstacle, she’d hire an assessor herself and Birgie wouldn’t kick about it.
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