“No, I think I've got a handle on it. I've got lists of things to do all over the house."
“You and your lists!" Shelley laughed. Jane was a compulsive list-maker, often breaking a single job down into components so she had more items to check off to bolster her sense of accomplishment. Sometimes, when she did something that wasn't on the list, she added it for the sole purpose of striking through it.
“If I don't have my lists, I just sit in a stupor, wondering what I'm supposed to be doing," Jane said. "But now I've got to start marking things off. Talk to you later.”
The caroling party was to be the next evening, so she had two days to prepare. Cleaning the house and getting out the holiday decorations were the first orders of business, but there was shopping and cooking to be done, as well as bill-paying, carpooling and all the other normal, time-consuming chores. She was looking for where the toilet brush had deliberately hidden itself when the doorbell rang.
Julie Newton stood on the front porch, staring at the Johnsons' house. She was so stricken by the sight that she didn't even notice when Jane opened the door.
“Decorative, isn't it?" Jane said.
Startled, Julie gasped, "I've — I've never seen anything quite like it."
“Come in before you freeze," Jane said.
Julie did as she was told, following Jane to the kitchen. "I have the most exciting thing to tell you," she said, shedding her coat and stocking cap, her fingers making dainty darting motions at her hair to fluff it. Julie Newton, Jane thought, would be cute all her life. She was the perky kind of woman who never seemed to age. Her eyes crinkled at the corners when she smiled, which was most of the time, and she was always in motion. Fluffing her hair, gesturing enthusiastically äs she spoke, swinging a leg when she was seated, and almost bouncing when she walked. A regular bundle of energy.
Jane offered her coffee or tea. Julie chose tea and squealed with delight at the sight of the plate of cookies Jane set on the table. "How darling! Jane, you're so clever!”
That's how she gets people to do things they don't want to, Jane thought. With flattery.
“Uh — what are these green ones supposed to be?" Julie asked.
“Elves. Don't ask. What's your news?”
Julie jiggled around in her chair with delight. "Oh, Jane. It's so neat! You know who Lance King is?"
“Lance K— oh, yes, that 'action reporter' on television. What's so exciting? Did somebody bump him off?"
“Bump him off? Oh, Jane, you're joking, right? You're so funny!"
“What about Lance King?"
“Well, you know he does all those reports on unfair stuff. Crooked businesspeople and sham charity organizations and all? But he sometimes hosts the regular nightly news from special events."
“Yes, I know.”
Julie was quivering with excitement and looked like she was about to explode with the thrill of it all. "Well, Jane. We are going to be his special event tomorrow night!" Her voice was almost a shriek of joy.
“What?" Jane asked, appalled.
“Yes, it's true. He's going to anchor the news from your house! From your very own house!”
“Oh, dear God…" Jane whimpered.
“Isn't it fabulous? I knew you'd be so excited."
“Julie, I don't think that's—" Jane started to bleat.
“No, don't thank me. It was a pleasure to do it. I just took myself in hand and said, 'Julie Newton, there's nothing to stop you. The worst that can happen is that he'll say no,' and so I just called the television station and they actually put me through to him. I told him about the neighborhood caroling party and even suggested it would be a nice change, to do a 'revealing' piece about something that went right instead of wrong. I told him all about the neighbors, what nice, interesting people they all are—"
“You told him all about us?" Jane asked.
The thought made her stomach hurt. She, and many others, thought Lance King was far and away the most obnoxious individual who ever got in front of a television camera. He was the expert at the surprise attack, taking a camera crew to some unsuspecting individual's home or place of business, shoving his way in, and asking 'Do you still beat your wife' questions and berating the victim, barely skirting FCC regulations on obscene language issues. If he'd really only taken on genuine crooks and rip-off artists, it might not have been so offensive. But as often as not, he was simply dead wrong in his accusations. He'd be back on a week later, making a patronizing apology that always managed to be every bit as insulting as the original interview.
According to newspaper accounts, the local station was always being hit with enormous libel suits, most of which they lost. Or more correctly, their insurance carrier lost. There had been an article only a month ago about the insurance carrier trying to drop the station's coverage, but the station had filed suit against the carrier, claiming it was the carrier's incompetent lawyers who were to blame. When it got to court, a judge had ruled in the station's favor. The newspaper reporter, mincing among the libel laws himself like a trained soldier in a minefield, managed to suggest, without saying so, that the judge was afraid of what Lance King might to do him if he didn't rule in the station's favor. The general manager of the television sta‑ tion had been quoted as saying that Lance King was the brightest star in their galaxy of fine reporters and they considered his reports an honorable and necessary public service. . blab, blah, blab. In other words, he was a point grabber and, Jane suspected, would have been out on his ear if the insurance had been canceled.
And now darling, cute, bubbly, idiotic Julie Newton had blabbed to him about their block caroling party, no doubt told him interesting tidbits about the neighbors and, worst of all, invited the jerk to Jane's house.
“Julie," Jane said, sitting down across from her and fixing her with a bleak stare, "you have to uninvite him. I won't have the man in my house.”
Julie quit bouncing in place for a minute. Then said, "Oh, Jane, another joke!" She wiggled like a happy puppy.
“I'm not joking, Julie," Jane said firmly. "You're going to have to call him back, explain that you failed to check with the hostess of the party in advance and she has now told you her house can't accommodate any more people — like him and his crew."
“Jane, I can't do that."
“You must do it. Otherwise I'm going to tell everyone the party after the caroling is canceled. Or you can have it at your house."
“No, I can't. I don't have a kitchen. I made some changes and Bruce couldn't finish it all." Julie sat very still for a moment. "He knows your name and address. Lance King does. I'm sorry, Jane, but he asked where the party was so he could come by early in the day and setup cameras. If I tell him you won't let him in, it'll make him mad at both of us."
“I don't care if he's mad at me," Jane said. "Are you sure?" Julie asked.
“What can I do?" Jane asked Shelley half an hour later. Shelley had responded instantly to Jane's frantic call for advice and sprinted across their driveways to chew the situation over. "Even if it hadn't been somebody obnoxious, Julie had no business inviting an outsider to my house."
“No, she didn't, but the problem now is to get rid of him," Shelley said.
“If I refuse to let him come, he'll be insulted and angry and he's the last person in the world I want to make enemies with," Jane said. "On the other hand, it makes my stomach hurt to think about having him in my house. People will think I'm expressing some sort of approval of his appalling behavior."
“You could come down with a sudden, violent, and highly contagious disease," Shelley suggested.
Jane shook her head. "No, nobody'd believe it. And I'd just end up sticking someone else in the neighborhood with the same problem. And I wouldn't even be able to help them out because of my smallpox or cholera or whatever.”
Shelley took a sip of her coffee. "Much as I like to be the neighborhood wise woman, always ready with a solution, I'm coming up empty on this one," she admitted. "How did you leave it with Julie?"
“You mean after I beat the stuffing out of her?
I've never been so tempted to smack somebody upside the head. I told her I wanted an hour to think about it.”
The doorbell rang and Jane found Bruce Pargeter standing on the front steps, looking very upset.
He introduced himself and Jane said, "I know you, Bruce. Remember, you put in new pantry shelves. Come in out of the cold."
“I remember. I wasn't sure you did.”
Bruce was a chunky, florid-faced young man, probably about thirty years old, Jane would have guessed, who lived with his widowed mother at the other end of the block. He was a wizard at fixing, repairing, or renovating almost anything. Almost everyone in the neighborhood had benefitted from his skills at one time or another. One of the advantages to having him around was that he was unfailingly cheerful and polite and had excellent taste. He could suggest to homeowners that their own ideas were dreadful without being the tiniest bit rude about it.