Meadowlark (29 page)

"With mushrooms and goat cheese."

"Hotsy-totsy."

He grinned and spooned the mushrooms into a dish.
"Neither of us has done any grocery shopping lately. That's the
cheese you bought at Christmas." He ducked down so he could see
Dale through the pass-through. "Want an omelet?"

"Uh, sure. Thanks."

So we ate omelets, and I filled Dale in on the events of the
afternoon. He recorded a lot of chewing and slurping. As he turned
the machine off and stowed it in its leather case, he said, "Good thing
you talked McDonald out of it before we got there. I hate a hostage
situation."

"Bianca talked him out of it." I finished my third cup of
coffee. I was going to be wired. "She promised him F. Lee
Bailey."

Dale snorted. "That'll make the prosecutor's day."

"
You
talked him out of it, Lark." Jay's voice was warm
with approbation. So I didn't argue.

He took me out to the farm, but said I'd have to drive myself
home in the Toyota.

I got out and faced him over the roof of the Accord. "You
could come back and get me."

He smiled. "Not on your life. I'm going straight to bed. I got
about two hours' sleep on that damned hospital cot last night."

"I'll tell you all about the workshop over breakfast."

He mimed a kiss and got back in the car. I watched him drive
off and wished I could go with him.

Frank Hrubek was sitting at the butcher block table in the
farmhouse kitchen, eating an enormous sandwich and eyeing
Marianne's canapés. He greeted me cheerfully.

I divested myself of coat and purse. "Are you okay?"

"Never better. Thanks to you, my dear."

Marianne took something from the oven, set it on the tiled
counter with a thump, and said Bianca wanted to see me. Somebody
didn't think I was wonderful.

I wasn't up to pacifying Marianne, and I didn't want to see
Bianca, either.

Marianne said her employer was off in the conference wing
showing the last of the journalists to their quarters. I took that as a
hint to leave Marianne's domain. Frank smiled at me around a bite of
sandwich.

Two strangers--one male, one female--fell silent as I entered
the living room. I gave them a distracted greeting. They told me their
names, and I forgot them immediately. The flowers were in place,
someone had built a fire, and the room looked like an upscale hotel
lobby--in other words, Keith's melodrama might as well not have
happened.

Whatever her opinion of me, Marianne's price was above
rubies. I checked to make sure someone had photocopied Frank's
handouts and the participants' schedules. Then Bianca entered from
the conference wing.

When she saw me, she walked over, her face as blank as it
had been for Keith that afternoon. There were no effusions of
greeting. She was pale but composed. "I'm going to make a statement
at eight. I'll leave everything else to you and Frank."

Thanks a lot. I made no comment. She nodded and went
over to talk to one of the writers.

Plan B got off to a fair start. Frank's charm and Marianne's
goodies kept the journalists happy for an hour. Del and Angie
circulated. All of us except Bianca trouped down to the seminar room
and the reporters admired the amenities. When we climbed up to the
computer room, they went into a feeding frenzy. They accessed the
Internet, scanned data bases, dived into the library, two of them
started playing games, and one, a woman with frizzy red hair,
borrowed a laptop. The others had brought their own. Angie and Del
conferred in a far corner. At least they were speaking to each
other.

Frank and I stood back against the French windows and
watched the writers mill, Frank smiling to himself, I listening. It was
safe to assume they hadn't heard of Keith's arrest yet. Bianca was
going to create a sensation.

When Frank and I finally herded the participants back to the
living room, she was waiting by the fireplace. She was all but tapping
her foot.

Bianca had a lot of presence, and she looked great for a
woman whose husband had just been arrested. She was wearing one
of her tunic outfits, but that night the colors inclined toward
melancholy--blues and muted greens. She climbed up on the ledge of
the fireplace and launched into speech.

She identified herself with charming modesty, thanked the
writers for coming, said she was sure they'd learn a great deal about
sustainable agriculture, and pointed out that the first session,
preceded by coffee and muffins, would begin at nine a.m. by which
time the broccoli harvest would be well underway. I had forgotten
the broccoli.

One of the writers, a grizzled veteran of newsrooms from
L.A. to Vancouver B.C., said, "What about this killing, Ms.
Fiedler?"

She gave him a melancholy smile calculated to freeze him
with guilt. "Your curiosity is understandable. I have some
information for you. This afternoon my husband, Keith McDonald,
was arrested..."

That got their attention. The redhead with the laptop
plumped down on the nearest chair, flipped the computer open, and
thumbed it on. The others began fumbling in purses and jacket
pockets for notebooks.

Bianca told them the charges and explained briefly about
Jason's wreck. She waited for them to quiet down. "As you may
imagine, I and my staff are devastated. I would have cancelled the
workshop, but it was too late."

Liar,
I thought without heat. If she had given me a
single reproachful glance, though, I would have walked out.

She touched her eyes with an honest-to-god lace
handkerchief. "Keith's lawyer has advised us not to comment on the
case. It is, as it were,
sub judice
, and I'm sure you won't want
to jeopardize Keith's defense. My staff..." She looked around--at Del,
at Angie, at Marianne, who was bringing on a fresh tray of
crudités, at me. "My staff have agreed not to give
interviews."

That was news to me. I glanced at Frank. He winked.

Rumbles of protest from the journalists.

Bianca smiled another brave, guilt-making smile. "I do
understand that you'll want color-stories, however, and of course
you may photograph the farm. Lieutenant Colman of the Shoalwater
County Sheriff's Department will be holding a press conference at
one tomorrow afternoon at the courthouse."

That was going to screw up the workshop schedule. I began
mentally rearranging the first field trip--a tour of Angie's
greenhouses. Fortunately, we had set the Shoalwater Bay expedition
for Tuesday afternoon. I wondered how much science writing the
journalists would do, given the temptation to file fiction with the
National Enquirer
.

Bianca gave the reporters nothing more. They tried, of
course. For ten minutes, they battered her with provocative, leading,
and occasionally stupid questions. She just stood there, smiling her
guilt-inducing smile, and shook her head.

Then it occurred to a couple of them that the bare fact of
Keith's arrest was a story they'd better sell while the market was hot.
The frizzy redhead made for the kitchen phone and the grizzled
veteran for the hall. The others soon dispersed in search of other
telephones. I think the phones in the conference wing were
extensions, but perhaps not. The reporters didn't return.

Bianca sent Del and Angie off, and Marianne began clearing
away the food debris. Frank Hrubek stuck around the living room
long enough to make it clear to Bianca that, arrest or no arrest, the
workshop was going to continue under his eagle eye. He wanted no
more interruptions of the schedule. She agreed meekly. He shook her
hand, grasped mine, stood on his tiptoes, and kissed my cheek. Then
he shuffled off to bed. We watched him go. What a man.

"Lark."

I turned.

Bianca's face was again without expression. "Keith wants to
see you."

"No," I said politely.

"He's very depressed. He wants to talk to you."

I looked deep into her intense brown eyes and lost my
temper. "I do not want to talk to Keith. Ever."

She blinked.

In case she had not grasped my point, I added, "I despise
Keith. I loathe what he did to Hugo." I'm afraid my voice was rather
loud, but I had had this small problem of getting a negative through
to Bianca.

She glanced toward the conference wing. "The
journalists--"

"The hell with them," I howled. "Do you know that Bill
Johnson is paralyzed? Do you care?"

Her eyes brimmed tears. "But you sounded so
understanding."

"I was lying through my teeth, Bianca. I just wanted Keith to
hand over that knife. I will not, repeat not, go to see him in jail or
anywhere else. Tell him that."

"Okay." Her voice was mild. She looked ruffled, even
embarrassed.

It was not the response I expected. I probably gaped like a
fish.

"Then you didn't mean what you said about F. Lee
Bailey?"

"That was the inspiration of the moment."

She looked at the carpet. "I don't intend to squander my, er,
patrimony on Keith's defense lawyers. He's guilty. If the charge is
manslaughter, I think he should plead guilty. If it's murder, I'll pay
for a decent Seattle lawyer, for the kids' sake. But I won't waste Eli
Fiedler's fortune defending the indefensible. Hugo was a good friend
to me. A better friend than Keith." She frowned at the floor. "Besides,
I have other uses for the money."

"The study center?"

She nodded, still not looking at me. "And the minute the
verdict is in, one way or another, I'm filing for divorce."

"Well," I said. "Good."

She looked at me finally, eyes at full wattage. "I couldn't get
through to Keith this afternoon. Thank God you did."

Considering I had told her to shut up, I thought that was
pretty generous. I said goodnight and went home.

I suppose the workshop was a success. It produced three
published articles on sustainable agriculture, a tribute to Frank's
ingenuity, knowledge, and charm. He worked those writers hard.
They barely had time to file six news stories, three color pieces, and
an interview with Carol Bascombe.

Bianca had forgotten to warn the interns not to speak to
reporters, and Carol obliged them. The broccoli harvest went on all
week. Frank left early Thursday morning, but not before he signed
my stock. I was sorry to see him go.

By Saturday, when the other workshop leader, Eric
Spielman, left in a rental car with the last of the reporters, I was near
collapse, Keith had been charged with second degree murder, and
Trish Groth had given birth to a healthy baby girl. An eventful
week.

I had recuperated sufficiently by Wednesday to leave Bonnie
in charge of the store. It was Jay's spring vacation, so he took me to
Raymond in the Accord. I brought a bouquet of Angie's certified
organic daffodils and my favorite edition of
A Child's Garden of
Verses
. Jay dropped me at the door of Trish's small, trim house,
and told me he'd be back in half an hour. Tactful. I thought that might
be about twenty-five minutes more than I could bear, but I didn't
protest.

Trish answered the door herself. I had phoned, so she was
expecting me. It is a cliché that new mothers look radiant.
Some, I am told, look like death warmed over, but Trish shone--her
hair gleamed, her complexion glowed, and her smile beamed like a
spring morning. She also looked about fifty pounds lighter. "Come in,
come in. The baby's asleep but we can take a peek. What lovely
flowers!"

I won't say I was instantly at ease, but I felt more cheerful.
Trish's mother, a slim woman with a champagne rinse and a
fashionable pantsuit, shook hands, smiling, and effaced herself.
Clearly she had no reservations about grandmotherhood.

Trish led me back to her bedroom. The baby was sleeping in
a bassinet by her mother's bed. "I'm nursing her," she murmured,
running a finger along the baby's rose-petal cheek. The baby, who
was wearing a lace cap, yawned and gave a tiny snort.

"What did you call her?" I whispered.

"Jane Christine. Jane for Jane Austen, Christine for Christine
de Pisan, the medieval writer." Trish caught my expression and
laughed aloud. "Hey, I'm a librarian! I promise to call her Jenny." She
ushered me back to the living room. "That's what Jane Austen's
brothers always called her."

I had to smile. In the lace cap, the baby looked a bit like the
only extant portrait of Jane Austen.

Trish pulled me down beside her onto a comfortable sofa
and unwrapped the book. "I love it. Look at the photographs."

I had found the 1940s edition my mother read to me. The
photos are black and white, and pure magic.

Trish turned the pages slowly, savoring. "I've already
started reading to her. You can't begin too soon."

"I know."

"Listen!" She began to read. She had a great voice, and she
didn't sing-song the verses.

"When I was down beside the sea
A wooden spade
they gave me
To dig the sandy shore.
My holes
were empty, like a cup.
In every hole, the sea came
up,
Till it could come no more."

She choked on the last line. "Oh, God, I miss Hugo."

I hugged her and said nothing.

She sniffed and gave a watery laugh. "Though why that
poem should remind me of him..."

"Well, there's an emptiness." I swallowed. "But life is filling
it. Maybe that's why." I thought about Hugo. He hadn't approved of
Trish's pregnancy, but he had approved of life.

We were both crying by then. Fortunately, Trish's mother
came in with tea and cookies, and the baby started howling, so it was
all right. Jay was waiting for me when I made my exit.

I was born in Montana, raised in Oregon, took a master's in
English at the University of Washington and in history at Portland
State. I taught English and history at Clark College in Vancouver WA
for many years and retired early to write full time. I have a son and
seventeen granddogs, and live in Vancouver with my husband, who
is also my computer guru. I enjoy cooking and traveling.