Whom Dog Hath Joined (21 page)

That gave me and Rochester an hour to kill. “That’s good.
I’ll see you then.”

I wanted to enjoy the fall afternoon and give Rochester a
walk, so I parked at the VFW Hall at the far end of town and we strolled to The
Chocolate Ear. Mark Figueroa was sitting at a table outside, reading the
New
York Times
and nursing a cappuccino.

“How’s it going?” I asked, settling into the chair across
from him. Some red and gold leaves from the maple above had already fluttered
to the ground.

“Well, if it isn’t Cupid,” he said drily. “Planning to shoot
any more arrows today?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said, feigning innocence.

“You’re trying to hook me up with Joey Capodilupo. I told
you, I don’t need your help to find a date.”

“He seems like a nice guy,” I said.

“Yeah, they all seem like that at first.”

I remembered that like Rick with Tamsen, Mark had had a date
the night before. “Did you go out with him last night?”

“Yes. And we had a good time.”

“So why are you busting my balls?”

“Because he’s going to turn out to be a jerk, and I’ll have
to work with him. And I don’t need this kind of drama.”

Rochester put his head on Mark’s lap and for once Mark
didn’t complain about dog hairs. “I should get a dog,” he said. “A Rottweiler
or something that could keep men away from my door.”

I stood up. “Well, you can practice with Rochester. I’m
going inside to see what kind of pastry Gail has.”

“Get me a napoleon,” Mark said. “Maybe if I get fat Joey
will leave me alone.”

I laughed. Mark was six-five at least, without an ounce of
fat on his bones. I doubted a dozen napoleons would make much difference.

When I walked inside, I saw Gail and Declan sitting at a
table by the wall, deep in conversation. None of the other tables were
occupied. “I guess this is why I couldn’t get service outside,” I said.

“Oh, gee, I didn’t even see you come up,” Gail said. “I’m
sorry.”

I waved my hand. “Love comes first.”

She blushed. “What can I get for you?”

I ordered a cappuccino and a chocolate croissant for myself,
a biscuit for Rochester and a napoleon for Mark. Gail disappeared into the
back. “How are things going?” I asked Declan.

“Very well, thank you,” he said. “I’m hoping to spirit the
chef away to dinner when she closes down.”

“Good luck with that. Gail works hard.”

“I’m discovering that,” Declan said.

I went back outside, and Gail delivered my order and Mark’s
napoleon a couple of minutes later. I shook my finger at her. “Remember, nobody
ever said on her deathbed I wish I’d worked more.”

“I know. But it’s hard running your own business. If I want
to go off with Declan I have to close down, and I need to squeeze every bit of
revenue I can.”

“It’s not like you’re bombarded with customers,” I said.
“And what time do you usually close, anyway?”

She looked at her watch. “In about an hour.”

“I’m supposed to meet Rick here in….” I looked at my watch.
“A half hour. If anybody comes up after that we’ll tell them that you closed.”

I paid her for the coffee, the croissant and the biscuit for
Rochester, and she went back inside. I delivered Mark his napoleon, and we sat
together for a few minutes, eating and watching traffic along Main Street. When
he finished, he said, “I’ve got to get going. I have a new assistant at the
store and I’ve already left her alone too long.”

A few minutes later, Rick took his place. “You know anything
about this Holt woman?” he asked, as he slid into the chair and then scratched
behind Rochester’s ears.

I shook my head. “Just that Edith said she was silly back
then. Which matches her hobby, I guess.” Rick had never seen the toilet paper
holders, and I was describing them when a Mini Cooper pulled up. I recognized
Mrs. Holt; she had straw blonde hair with an unnatural brassiness and skin so
tight it had to have been artificially augmented. I stood up to greet her.
“Mrs. Holt? I’m Steve Levitan. We met at the Harvest Festival, when my
girlfriend and I were helping out at Gail’s table.”

“Oh, yes, I remember,” she said. “Gail’s pastries are so
delicious!”

I introduced Rick, and he offered to go inside and get a
coffee for her. “And one of those delicious pastries, if you like.”

“I adore her rum balls,” Mrs. Holt said, and she giggled girlishly.
“And there’s something so naughty about asking for them, don’t you think?”

“Coffee and a rum ball,” Rick said, and he went inside.

I introduced Mrs. Holt to Rochester, and she smiled
nervously. “I’m not much of a dog person,” she said.

“Don’t worry, he’s very attuned to people,” I said. “He
won’t bother you.”

And he didn’t. He stayed on the pavement and continued
chewing his biscuit.

“The detective said you had some questions about the 1960s,”
she said. “What’s this all about?”

“Why don’t we wait for Rick to come back,” I said. “I’m sure
he’ll want to ask the questions. I agreed to join him because I mentioned that
I’d met you at the Harvest Fair.”

Rick came out a few moments later, balancing two Styrofoam
cups of coffee and a paper plate of rum balls. “Gail said to tell you last
call,” he said to me. “She’s closing up.”

“I’m good.”

He sat between us and turned to Mrs. Holt. He explained that
the bones found at the Meeting House belonged to one of the last boys who had
passed through en route to Canada.

“Not Peter!” she said, her mouth opening.

“You remember him?” Rick asked.

“Oh, yes. I made a point of meeting all the young men we
helped. I wanted them to know that someone at home would be thinking of them. I
often went over to the Meeting House to talk to them.”

“Did you talk to Peter and the other boy with him?” Rick
asked.

“Well, just Peter,” she said. “The other one wasn’t very
friendly. And he was too restless to sit around. He went out for a while, and
Peter and I sat in one of the offices at the back of the Meeting House and
talked, oh, for hours.”

“What can you tell me about Peter?” Rick asked.

“He was a very bright boy. He desperately wanted to go to
college but his parents didn’t have a spare nickel for him, and they didn’t
have such big scholarships back then as they do today. The best he could have
managed was to go part-time, and that wasn’t enough to keep him out of the
service.”

She picked up her coffee and sipped, then bit into one of
the rum balls. Since Rick had brought a plate of them, I took one myself,
ignoring his dark look.

“Did Peter have any plans once he got to Canada?” Rick
asked.

“Just to go to school. We had heard, you know, that there
were people at the universities in Canada who were sympathetic to draft
resisters. He had a couple of names of people at various schools.”

“And the other boy, Don? Did he get back while you were
still there?”

She shook her head. “I only saw him the once, very briefly.”
She sniffed. “He asked me where people who smoked dope hung out.”

“Did you tell him?”

“Of course I didn’t have any habits like that,” she said. “I
was a very good girl. And my, I was only about eighteen or nineteen. I had
heard rumors, though, about hippies who camped out in the woods behind the
Meeting House. I told him that’s all I knew.”

She picked up another rum ball. “These are so delicious,”
she said.

Behind us, I saw Declan flip the “Open” sign on the café’s
front door to “Closed.”

“Those were such special times,” Mrs. Holt said. “John
Brannigan was so handsome and dashing, and he kept telling us what good work we
were doing. He called us his girls, you know.” She looked at her watch. “Well,
I’m afraid I must dash. Have to get Sunday supper on the table.”

“Thank you,” Rick said. “You’ve been very helpful.”

She left, and I picked up the last rum ball on the plate. “It’s
another piece of the puzzle,” I said. “Don left the Meeting House looking for
dope.”

“But he had to have come back alive,” Rick said. “There’s no
way you could get a dead body in there."

“They could have argued,” I said. “Don and Pete. Don sounds
like a slacker, and Pete a smart kid. Maybe things got physical, and Pete
killed Don.”

“You’re jumping to conclusions again,” Rick said. “I’m not
saying that’s not what happened, but we still have more pieces of the puzzle to
fill in.”

I remembered what Edith had said, that even as a kid I was
curious about everything. That curiosity had gotten me into trouble in the
past, and I hoped it wouldn’t do so this time.

26 – Husband of the Year

When Rochester and I were back in the car, I decided I
needed to see Lili in person to tell her what I’d done. So instead of heading
for home, I drove up the River Road to Leighville. I stopped at the Genuardi’s
outside town and bought a fall bouquet, asters and chrysanthemums in shades of
red, yellow and brown.

Lili rented a second-floor apartment in a converted Victorian
a few blocks from campus. The owners had restored it to its former glory,
cleaning the small stained-glass windows, refinishing the pine floors, and
painting the crown moldings. She had decorated it with an artist’s eye, though
she didn’t display her own work. There were a couple of art-quality photographs
and a few pen-and-ink drawings by undiscovered geniuses, but most of the
apartment was simple and uncluttered, with classic Craftsman-style furniture
and hand-knotted wool rugs from Mexico.

“This is a nice surprise,” Lili said, when she opened the
door. I handed her the flowers and we kissed. Rochester pushed past me into her
living room, intent on something.

“What brings you up here?” she asked, as she led me inside.
“You want to have dinner? I’m making spaghetti sauce to put up for the winter.
It should be ready in a half hour or so, and I can boil up some pasta.”

“First I have something to tell you,” I said.

She looked at me. “It’s all right. I shouldn’t have even
brought it up.”

I was confused. Brought up what? I’d just gotten there.
Rochester circled around twice and settled on the rug in front of the sofa. Oh,
moving in together. I’d forgotten about that when I got caught up in my hacking
angst.

“You may be changing your mind,” I said. “Come on, sit down
with me.”

We sat on the sofa, slightly turned so we were facing each
other. “I made a mistake today. I’m sure it’s not the last one I’ll ever make,
but it reminded me that I still have a long way to go to be the guy you
deserve.”

Her eyes were dark and her voice serious. “What did you do?”

“I hacked into this reunion database online, looking for
information on Peter Breaux.”

She looked at me, and then burst into laughter.

My bafflement must have shown on my face, because she took
my hands in hers. “Oh, sweetie, I know that no one gets over problems
overnight. I thought you were…”

“What?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know, confessing that you’d cheated
on me or something.”

“I’d never do that,” I said. “I know that Phillip probably
told you that, too, and it was a lie. But I’m not Phillip. I’m not wired that
way. Even when things were at their worst with Mary, when we were sleeping in
separate beds and she was telling me I was the most awful husband in the world,
I never once considered cheating.”

“Clearly you were never the worst husband in the world,”
Lili said. She leaned forward and kissed me again. “Not even in the top ten.”

I kissed her and then pulled back. “In the top twenty?” I
said, with mock irritation.

“Well, you did commit a felony and go to prison,” she said.
“So you’re out of the running for husband of the year.”

“I guess I’ll just have to try harder.” I leaned forward and
we kissed again. I felt like the anvil that had been in the pit of my stomach
had floated away, and I was very, very lucky.

That would have been a good time to bring up our moving in
together, I guess, but I was worried Lili would see it as a bounceback after my
hacking confession. I owed it to her and to myself to make sure I was saying
yes for all the right reasons.

She sniffed the air. “My sauce,” she said, and jumped up.
Rochester was right on her heels, hoping there was food in the offing.

I followed them both. “Taste this,” Lili said, offering me a
wooden spoon with some rich orange-red sauce on it.

It was delicious, and I told her so. “I use fresh tomatoes,
but I dehydrate them first to concentrate the flavor. Why don’t you set the
table while I put up some pasta?”

We ate dinner with Rochester at my feet, and then went into
Lili’s bedroom, where we cuddled together and then read for a while.

I didn’t stay over, because I didn’t have clothes with me
for the next day, but I drove home in a much better mood than I’d been in on
the way upriver.

Monday morning, I took Rochester for his walk around eight.
As we walked, I noted the arrival of the maids and the nannies. Some came in
their own cars, while others walked in from one of the bus stops along Main
Street. We passed, as usual, an obese Russian man in his sixties, wheeling his
tiny grandchild in a stroller, as well as a number of other dogs and their
parents. The Camerons, who spent winters in Florida, were having their gutters
cleaned, in preparation for their departure, and Bob Freehl was standing in his
driveway supervising the work of an exterminator.

I felt like a slacker, when so many people around me were
either already at work, or on their way there, and I still had an hour before I
had to be at Friar Lake. Not for the first time I blessed my parents, first
generation Americans who had worked hard so that I could get an education and
qualify for a skilled job. Peter Breaux hadn’t been so lucky, and I was sure
that many of those maids and yard workers were intelligent, often educated in
their home countries, but their immigrant status or limited language skills
restricted them to manual labor.