When Sisters Mary Helen and Eileen arrived at Erma’s apartment, the front door was slightly ajar. Quietly they went up the narrow staircase. Caroline and Lucy were already in the living room standing silently beside a couple of armchairs. Finn, this time fully dressed with his long strand of hair plastered neatly in place, stared sullenly out the window.
An unnatural silence filled the whole place. Actually, the scene looked, to Mary Helen’s way of thinking, like a wake without a corpse, or refreshments either, for that matter.
“You beat us here.” Eileen’s cheerful greeting seemed to jar the group into action.
Smiling, Lucy walked toward the Sisters. “That’s the trouble with being punctual,” she said, attempting to be light. “Nobody’s ever there to appreciate it.”
Finn turned, nodded his head toward them, but said nothing. His eyes were red-rimmed and blinked nervously as he looked from woman to woman. Probably his bistro hadn’t closed until two A.M.
Caroline in a wide-brimmed black straw skimmer began to remove her gloves, one long finger at a time. If Mary Helen hadn’t known better, she would have picked Caroline out as the chief mourner.
“Why don’t we put your things in the bedroom?” Lucy offered, leading the way.
Mary Helen was laying her coat across the end of Erma’s bed when she noticed a black looseleaf binder propped against the leg of the nightstand. Before she even thought about it, she stooped over and picked it up.
“That’s our journal,” Lucy said “I guess she left without that too.”
Mary Helen must have looked puzzled.
“You remember, Sister. Erma and I started taking that intensive journal-writing workshop at the college. Well, that’s the binder they gave us. She must write in it just before she goes to sleep, like I do.” Lucy tried to smile, but her chin quivered. “It has all kinds of colored dividers with tabs to record our different experiences.”
“And all those experiences are intensely personal,” Eileen said, narrowing her eyes at Mary Helen, who immediately put the journal back where she found it.
“I was only going to look at the tabs,” she whispered, following Eileen back into the living room.
“Here comes another one,” Finn, trying to be helpful, announced from his place at the window.
“It must be Noelle. Good! As soon as Erma’s daughter arrives we can get started.” Caroline checked her wrist-watch. “You did tell her ten-thirty, didn’t you?”
Lucy nodded just as Noelle, in a whirl of blue, arrived at the top step. “Sorry I’m late,” she said. “Shall we begin by going over the facts we already know?”
She motioned them to sit down. Without a word, everyone, even Finn, followed her into the small dining area and sat down at the table. Noelle, their undisputed leader, took her place at the head.
“Erma’s daughter isn’t here, I see,” Noelle began. “Maybe that’s just as well. We can talk more freely among ourselves.” She glanced over at Finn. “Thank you, Mr. Finn, for letting us into the apartment this morning. I know it must have been an inconvenience. Please feel free to go about your busy routine. We’ll make sure to return the key when we’re done.”
Finn fidgeted uncomfortably but didn’t move. It was obvious that he had something to say but wasn’t too sure how to say it. “Look, ladies…” he began finally, his jaw, Mary Helen thought, set a little like that of a not-too-friendly bulldog. “Erma’s my friend. Besides that, she works for me and this here is my apartment house. I want to be in on whatever happens.”
Short, sweet, and very much to the point. Mary Helen watched the look of surprise freeze on Noelle’s face.
“I see,” their leader responded crisply. “I suppose that’s reasonable.” Her bright blue eyes jumped from woman to woman, waiting for a comment.
“It would seem to me-” Eileen cleared her throat Mary Helen had seen her friend look calmer addressing a crowd of five hundred-“that under the circumstances, Mr. Finn might be a great help.”
One look at the man’s beaming face and no one had the heart to ask, What circumstances?
“Very well.” Noelle’s voice brought down the imaginary gavel, and Finn became one of the group.
Mary Helen smiled over at the man. Poor fellow had no idea what he was getting into. She wondered for a moment how he would fit in.
“How shall we proceed?” Noelle was all business.
“This may seem a bit superficial,” Eileen said. Mary Helen knew that would never stop her. “But before she gets here, I’d like to know Erma’s daughter’s real name. It can’t be Ree, surely.”
The group looked toward Lucy. After all, it was Lucy who knew Erma best and Lucy who had called her “Ree.”
Surprisingly, it was Finn who spoke up. “It’s Marie. Everyone calls her Ree for short And the brothers are Junior and Buddy. Thomas and Richard, actually.”
Noelle looked a little annoyed. Being part of the group is one thing, her expression said, but taking over, Mr. Finn, is something else again!
Finn must have caught the look. He began to blink nervously, then studied the scuffed toes of his shoes.
Funny fellow, Mary Helen thought, trying not to stare at the man. On the one hand, he was nervous and seemingly shy; on the other, he was tough enough to get his own way. And, although his overall appearance was a bit seedy, he did own a building and operate a successful-looking restaurant. Yes, indeed, he was a hard one to peg! The only thing she felt certain of was that he did care for Erma Duran.
Before she could give the man any more thought, a bang of the front door and a stumbling sound from the bottom of the stairs announced the arrival of Erma’s daughter, Ree.
“I’m sorry I’m late. I wasn’t feeling too well this morning.”
The high, breathless voice floating up the staircase set Mary Helen’s nerves on edge. God help us, she thought A whiner!
“If it isn’t her ass, it’s her elbow,” Mary Helen was almost sure she heard Caroline whisper to Lucy. The astonished look on Finn’s face convinced her she had heard correctly.
Lucy rose and went to the banister. The rest of the group turned to watch.
“Come on up, Ree, honey. We just got here.” Holding out her short arms, Lucy waited for the young woman to come to the top of the stairs. As soon as she did, she reached up to hug her and kiss both of Ree’s dimpled cheeks.
“Aren’t you feeling well, honey?” Lucy asked.
Ree shook her head and pulled her full mouth into a pout “I’m so worried about Mommy.”
“Don’t worry, honey.” Lucy soothed her almost as if she were a small child. “We’re all here to help.”
Even though Ree wore no makeup and, girllike, had pulled her blond-streaked hair into a ponytail, Mary Helen judged her to be at least thirty-five.
Lucy looked confidently around at the assembled group. “We’ll find your mother and bring her home where she belongs.”
Mary Helen wished she felt as confident as Lucy sounded. They hadn’t even considered the possibility that Erma might not want to be found.
For a moment, Ree, her chubby face still flushed, stood at the edge of the room. She tugged self-consciously at the back of the flowered blouse that hung well over her snug navy pants. The more she tugged, the more the buttonholes down its front pulled away from the tiny buttons.
“Come over, dear. Sit down.” Lucy patted the chair next to her. “You’ve met everyone here, I’m sure, except the nuns.”
The look on Noelle’s face said, Make the introductions brief. And Lucy did.
“Now, then,” Noelle began. “Our job is to locate Erma.”
Ree wrinkled her short nose and sniffled. Good night, nurse! Mary Helen squirmed, exasperated. Not only does the woman whine, she sniffles.
“Ree”-Noelle directed her gaze toward Erma’s daughter-“Mr. Finn tells us that your mother mentioned going to St. Louis.”
“She never said that to me.” Ree tugged again at her blouse and focused her large eyes accusingly at Finn. “Why would she tell him if she didn’t tell me?”
Finn leaned forward in his chair. For a moment he looked as if he might tell her why.
“That’s beside the point,” Mary Helen interjected, remembering only too well Finn’s opinion of Erma’s children. She didn’t want to appear rude, but this meeting was too important to let personal animosities disrupt it.
“What we want to know is, have you any idea whom we can phone to get in touch with your mother?”
“I can’t imagine who she’d go to see in St. Louis.” Ree sniffled again.
“Are there no relatives there, dear?” Caroline’s straw skimmer bobbed impatiently.
Her dark eyes filling, Ree shook her head.
“Friends, perhaps?” Caroline probed.
“Poor Mommy. You know her social-security check still hasn’t come.” Ree, ignoring the question, stared at Finn.
“Friends?” Caroline insisted, despite the growing feeling of tension in the room.
“Only Auntie Barbara.”
“Auntie Barbara?” the group repeated in unison.
“Not our real aunt. Just a friend of Mommy’s from college way back. But I’m not really sure exactly where in St. Louis she lives.”
“Now we’re beginning to get someplace.” Beside her, Eileen beamed. Mary Helen did not feel quite so optimistic. Something was bothering her. She must have been frowning because Noelle nodded her blue-rinsed head toward the old nun. “What’s wrong, Sister?”
“Well… I was just wondering about the money. Erma’s social-security check hadn’t come, and Lucy mentioned to Caroline and me that Erma was worried about money while we were in New York. How could she afford the fare to St. Louis?”
She was just about ready to answer her own question-Visa or MasterCard, of course-when Finn spoke up.
“I lent it to her.” He shrugged.
Ree glared at the little man. “You lent it to Mommy? You? Why, you can hardly pay her salary on time.”
“I got lucky.”
“At the track, I suppose.” This time Ree sniffed rather than sniffled. “Just like my father. He-”
All eyes shifted to Finn. Face flushed, he raised his broad hand, as if to stop stones instead of words. “Whoa!” he shouted. “Your father was a good man and a good friend of mine.”
The words echoed in the small dining room. Mary Helen could hear the others twisting uncomfortably in their chairs, the way people do who have inadvertently stumbled into a family fight. Several cleared their throats. Eileen, she noticed, was studying a cobweb on the chandelier.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Noelle interrupted quickly.
Mary Helen could sense the relief.
“We are straying from the point. How are we going to proceed with finding our friend Erma?”
Caroline, eager to help her neutralize the situation, raised her index finger. “Let’s divide the duties,” she suggested, with a nod toward Noelle, “then schedule another meeting.”
“Fine.” Noelle took a pocket calendar from her navy-blue leather handbag. “We had better not wait too long.” She paused briefly, waiting for comments. When there were none, she continued. “Shall we say tomorrow, same time, same place?”
That settled, Caroline went back to dividing. “When we are through here, Lucy, you and I can go back to the college and search through the alumnae records.” She tipped her skimmer toward the Sisters for tacit permission. “I’m sure we will be able to unearth a Barbara in Erma’s class, or in one close to it, who lives in the vicinity of St. Louis,” she said when the Sisters had nodded back. “Between us, we can make the calls.
“Marie, you, of course, should contact your brothers. See if they perhaps know where your mother has gone. Possibly she confided in one of the boys.
“Noelle, you’re good with government-type things. Perhaps you could place calls to the St. Louis Police Department and to hospitals, just in case-and I hate to even mention it-something may have happened to Erma.
“Mr. Finn”-Caroline had clearly thought out her plan-“there must be an organization of restaurant owners or something of that nature in that area…”
The man squinted at her as if she had just dropped in from another planet. “You talking about the waitresses’ union?”
“I suppose I am.” Caroline cleared her throat. “And you, Sisters”-Mary Helen tried not to appear too eager-“you two can do what you do best: pray.”
“Pray, indeed!” Mary Helen muttered, fumbling in her pocketbook for the car keys. On the curb behind her, she could hear Eileen chuckling.
“What’s so funny?” she asked without turning around.
“If you could have seen your face, old dear, when Caroline said, ‘Pray.’ You got so red, I was afraid you might burst.”
“I did no such thing.” Mary Helen finally unlocked the car door. “I was just surprised, that’s all.”
“Oh, and what, may I ask, surprised you?”
“That the poor woman does not know that prayer without good works is dead.”
“Isn’t that faith without good works, old dear?”
“Same difference.” Mary Helen adjusted her bifocals, then fastened her seat belt.
She turned the key in the ignition. “And if she thinks for one moment that I’m going to let my prayers die, she has another think coming.”
“I could well have predicted that,” Eileen muttered, her brogue thickening.
“By the way,” Mary Helen asked, eager to change the subject, “what did you make of that little scene between Ree and Mr. Finn just now?”
“I was about to ask you the same question,” Eileen said. “But since you asked me first, I would say that, deep down, those two have a couple of ill-stirred pots about to come to a full boil.”
Mary Helen had never heard her say that before. “Is that another of your old sayings from home?”
“No, I just made it up,” Eileen said with a complacent smile. “And what do you make of it?”
“Just about the same as you do.” Mary Helen checked her wristwatch. “We’re in luck,” she said. “It’s only eleven-thirty. We can surely make it to the Hall of Justice before Kate Murphy goes to lunch.”
Sister Mary Helen was surprised when she and Eileen walked into the Hall of Justice. The police department had erected a plywood barricade across the entire foyer. Well, what can you expect? she asked herself. After all, you haven’t been in the building for nearly two years. Things do change.
A security checkpoint, much like that in an airport, had been built at one end. It instructed them ENTER HERE.
“Where are you going, ladies?” the uniformed officer asked, returning their pocketbooks.
“To the Homicide Detail,” Mary Helen answered. The policeman looked a little surprised, she thought, but not nearly as surprised as Kate Murphy did when she saw the two of them in the doorway of Room 450. And poor Inspector Gallagher! Flabbergasted was the only word that would adequately describe his reaction.
“Hi, Sisters,” Kate called.
The crowded detail suddenly became still. One by one the homicide detectives turned their heads toward the doorway. Some smiled, some half rose. O’Connor, whom she remembered from the last time she was here, offered a weak, “Hi, ’Sters!”
The room was much the same as Mary Helen remembered it. If anything, it was more cluttered with more papers. Perhaps an additional wooden desk or two had been shoved together on the cramped floor space.
Suit jackets were slung over the backs of swivel chairs, just the way she remembered. Looking around the room, you would swear that these tall, burly men were nothing more than messy real-estate agents-except, of course, for the gun each one had strapped in his shoulder holster or onto his belt.
Kate crossed the room, smiling, and gave each of the nuns a hug. “So nice to see you,” she said.
Mary Helen smiled back. Kate looked wonderful. Married life seemed to really be agreeing with her. If she had changed at all, she was more slim and trim than she had been. Not a speck of gray shone in her red hair. There was a peaceful expression on her open, freckled face. Mary Helen did notice faint shadows under Kate’s Wedgwood-blue eyes and wondered, for a moment, what that was all about.
Across the room, Inspector Dennis Gallagher stood by his desk next to a large window, his face flushed. As he struggled to refasten his tie, the man made a feeble attempt to look pleased to see them. Actually, Mary Helen thought, his expression was more like a grimace.
“Come in, come in.” Kate ushered the nuns through the maze of phones and filing cabinets and pulled up two chairs next to the pushed-together desks she and Gallagher shared.
“What brings you here today?” Behind her, Mary Helen could hear the quiet room become even quieter. Like one of those old commercials on TV where E. F. Hutton speaks, she thought, amused.
Kate may have looked at Eileen, or perhaps Eileen only thought she did.
“I’ll be switched if I can figure it out,” she heard her friend whisper, her brogue a bit on the thick side.
“Sister?” Kate smiled, looking first at Mary Helen. Then she looked around the detail, with what the old nun thought could only be described as a glare. Slowly, the typewriters and phone dials began to make noise again.
Gallagher perched his ample bottom on the edge of one desk, hitched up his trouser legs, and leaned forward, ready to listen. “Tell us what’s on your mind, ’Ster?”
Clearing her throat, Mary Helen slowly shoved her bifocals up the bridge of her nose and looked from inspector to inspector. “You remember, of course, Kate, my calling you yesterday about my OWL friend, Erma Duran?”
Kate nodded.
“Well, not one of us OWLs has seen or heard from her for almost a week now. We are really becoming very concerned.” She paused for effect. It must have worked.
Inspector Gallagher leaned over even farther and began to dig into his pockets, searching, Mary Helen assumed, for his cigar. She spotted it in the full ashtray behind him. Better for his lungs and heart if I let him search, she thought, switching her attention back to Kate.
“Today several of us met with her daughter and her employer. Strangely, neither of them has heard from Erma either.”
Kate frowned and began to twist a thick lock of her hair. Good! Mary Helen knew full well that was a sign the girl was thinking.
“A whole week, you say?”
“One week tomorrow, to be exact.”
Gallagher found his cigar and scratched a match on the under edge of his desktop. “But no body, huh, ’Ster?” He squinted one eye against the smoke rising from the stub.
Sitting taller in her chair, Mary Helen put on her best schoolmarm face. Gallagher, she suspected, was about to dismiss her as worrying without cause. “As you know, Inspector, finding no body does not necessarily mean that no harm has come to the woman.”
Grinning, Gallagher pushed himself off the edge of the desk, put his cigar back in the ashtray, and, with his hands free, tucked his shirt into his pants. “You’re absolutely right, ’Ster.” He shrugged his shoulder. “But what it does mean is that if there is no body, then there is no case for Homicide.”
Mary Helen frowned. In her opinion, Inspector Gallagher looked and sounded entirely too pleased. She wasn’t about to be put off so easily. She turned back toward Kate.
“What I think we should do, Sisters”-Kate folded her hands on the desk in front of her and studied her thumbnails-“is turn you over to Missing Persons.”
If Mary Helen hadn’t known better, she would have suspected from the look on her face that Kate Murphy was a bit too pleased also.
Removing her earring, Kate picked up the phone receiver and dialed.
“Isn’t it just down the hallway?” Mary Helen mouthed to Gallagher.
“They moved it.” Gallagher stared out the window at the James Lick Freeway. “Missing Persons has gone over with Juvenile, to the old Northern Station on Greenwich. They’re moving everything around. Nothing’s the same as it used to be.”
“Okay, Sisters.” Kate slammed down the receiver. “It’s all set. That was Inspector Ronald Honore. He’s from Missing Persons. Honore is swamped this afternoon, but call him first thing on Monday morning. He’ll help you make out a report if you still need one.”
Kate scribbled on a scrap of paper. “Here is his name”-she handed the note to Mary Helen-“his phone number, and where you can find him.”
As they left the detail, Mary Helen was almost certain she heard Gallagher say, “Hot damn, Katie-girl! Those two couldn’t happen to a nicer guy!”
“Why were you so quiet in there?” Mary Helen asked, suddenly realizing that Sister Eileen had said almost nothing while they were in Room 450.
“I just can’t seem to get over it.” Eileen took a deep breath and stepped into the elevator. “It must be from when I was a girl back home. The garda inhibits me. So many of them all together in that one room.”
Mary Helen stared at her friend. “Glory be to God, Eileen. You left Ireland well over fifty years ago. And then you were probably not even twenty years old. Besides which, you lived in the country. How much experience could you have possibly had with the garda? Besides, nothing inhibits you.”
Eileen pulled herself up to her full height. “There are some things, Mary Helen, that are part of a person’s heritage. Some things you are born to and brought up with that you just don’t forget. Some things that are just part and parcel of a person.”
Mary Helen narrowed her eyes at her friend. “Eileen, have you been listening to the Clancy Brothers and those Irish rebellion ballads again?”
Her short nose in the air, Sister Eileen walked out of the Hall of Justice several paces ahead of Sister Mary Helen.
Outside, the day was gray and drizzly. A sharp wind whipped down Bryant Street, bowing the sycamores in front of the Hall. The sky looked as though someone had shaded in the whole thing with a number-two pencil. Overhead, one small spot of gray was a little brighter than the rest. Probably the sun trying to break through, although Mary Helen thought the effect was as if someone in heaven had turned on a forty-watt bulb.
When they reached the car, the old nun studied the scrap of paper Kate had given her. It read “Inspector Ron Honore, 2475 Greenwich” and gave the phone number and the extension.
Even though Eileen was fiddling with her own seat belt, she must have noticed what Mary Helen was doing. “Kate said to call the man on Monday.” Mary Helen noted the wary edge in her friend’s voice. “You are not planning to go in there now?”
“Not in”-Mary Helen tried to sound incredulous that Eileen would even think such a thing-“just by.”
“Is that a good idea?” Eileen’s question hung in the air. Mary Helen didn’t answer. It seemed better that way.
The downtown streets around the Hall of Justice always confused her. Some were one-way. Some put you right on the freeway heading to San Jose. And some led you to God knew where.
Trying to be helpful, Eileen peered at the signs and arrows along Harrison Street, reading them aloud. “Let’s head for Van Ness,” she said finally. “We know for sure that goes across town. From there we can get home.”
Mary Helen smiled. Eileen must be confused too. That made her feel a little better. Surely, Van Ness or at least South Van Ness must be around there somewhere. Under the freeway, Mary Helen made a quick right turn.
“Mary Helen! Not here!”
Jerking her foot off the gas pedal, heart pounding, Mary Helen looked both ways, but she couldn’t see what she had done wrong.
“What is it, Eileen?” she asked, her knees shaking.
Eileen pointed to the street sign, her gray eyes open in horror. “You turned onto 13th, old dear. Could there be a more unlucky street in all of San Francisco?”
Behind them, horns honked impatiently. Mary Helen could feel her blood pressure rise. “You and your blasted superstitions” was all she had the strength to say, for which she was grateful-not nearly so grateful, however, as Eileen should have been.
Relieved when they finally spotted the sign for South Van Ness, Mary Helen turned right. As they inched their way along the wide boulevard and across the City, Eileen seemed a little sheepish.
She didn’t even object, Mary Helen noticed, when they passed the Opera Plaza and Turk Street, where they should have turned for the college. She did grunt when they went by Tommy’s Joynt on the corner of Van Ness and Geary. But that was understandable. It was nearly lunchtime, and although buffalo stew might not sound very appealing, the hot turkey sandwich did. At the thought of it, her own stomach growled.
By the time they had passed Hippo’s Hamburgers and neared the towering stone edifice of St. Brigid’s Church, Sister Eileen had seemingly resigned herself to the inevitable.
Silently the pair zipped past Phillip Mason’s Hair Salon and around a parked Muni bus. “The next one’s Greenwich,” Eileen announced with a little edge on her voice. Apparently she had recovered from feeling sheepish. “And I am starving. So let’s make short work of whatever you have in mind. And I dare not even imagine what that might be.” She shuddered.
The old Northern Station was sandwiched in the middle of a block of well-kept stucco homes, flats, and modern apartment buildings. The station itself, with its large ornate lanterns over the entrance steps, was a leftover from the Pan American Exposition of 1915.
Only nine years after the earthquake and fire, Mary Helen had read somewhere, the city had filled in land from the Bay, built the magnificent Palace of Fine Arts, and played host to the exposition. The Northern Station at the far end of the landfill had guarded it all.
Mary Helen drove by the building once, turned, and drove by again. “As long as we’re here, we may just as well go in, meet the man and say, How do,” she said, as if it were a sudden idea.
“I wish I had placed a wager” was Eileen’s only comment as she unbuckled her seat belt.
“Can I help you, ladies?” a slight police inspector with thick, curly gray hair greeted them the moment they opened the glass front door. He must have been watching them parallel park. And he would have had plenty of time, Mary Helen figured. It always took her several tries to get close enough to the curb to be legal.
“We were just looking for Inspector Honore.” She peeked into the next room, which, from the door at least, looked just as crowded, if not as large, as the Homicide Detail.
“If he’s not too busy,” Eileen added quickly.
“Honore? He’s the big guy over there.” The man pointed to the far corner where a computer-made HAPPY ST. PATRICK’S DAY banner still hung on the wall.
“He’s the one below the poster. With USF’s basketball schedule.”
Mary Helen looked toward the corner where the inspector was pointing. A husky back hunched over an old-fashioned typewriter.
“Honore! For you,” the man called from the doorway.
“Yo!” Raising his index finger, the fellow stood up and turned toward them.
For a moment, Mary Helen was startled. She adjusted her bifocals just to make sure. Why, standing there, Inspector Honore looked, for all the world, just like a big black Kojak without the hat.
Separately, Kate and Jack drove up in front of their peaked-roofed home on 34th and Geary at exactly the same time.
When Jack saw her, he circled the block, leaving the parking place in front of the house for Kate. He squeezed into one farther up the hill, almost at 35th. Dripping fog rolling in from the Pacific quickly covered Geary Boulevard like cold steam. In the distance, foghorns bleated.
“Contrary to popular opinion, chivalry is not dead.” Jack bounded up the green wooden steps and stood behind her.
Shivering, Kate fumbled to get the key into the dead bolt. “Thanks, pal. First one in turns on the heat.” She pushed open the wooden door.
Jack threw on the switch for the thermostat. Kate could hear the ancient furnace in the basement thump on. Side by side, they stood in front of the old-fashioned heating grate in the baseboard.
“Anything new or different?” Jack asked.
“I took your advice,” Kate said.
“Now that is new and different! What advice?”
“I made an appointment with the gynecologist. Actually, today I couldn’t get away from Gallagher long enough to phone, so I stopped by the office on my way home. Do you have any idea how long it takes to get an appointment?”
“I must admit I don’t.”
“Six weeks! I can’t get in until June twenty-eighth.” Kate stared at him, waiting for a reaction. When she didn’t get one, she pulled a blue and white pamphlet out of her coat pocket and handed it to Jack. “I picked this up while I was there. It says one thing that causes infertility is stress. We have to do something to lessen our stress.”
Blasts of hot air rose from the grate, warming Kate’s feet, then shooting up under her skirt to the goose-bumps on her legs and thighs.
Jack flipped through the pamphlet, then laid it on the hall table. “No big deal!” He hung up his jacket in the closet and stored his gun on the top shelf. “Let’s start by not cooking tonight.”
Kate suspected it was Jack’s turn to cook.
“It’s Friday night. Let’s go out to dinner. There’s a new Chinese place on Clement.”
“I’m serious,” Kate said. By now she was warm enough to take off her coat too.
“I’m serious too. Let’s just have a relaxing evening together. No cooking, no dishes.”
Kate had to admit it sounded like a good place to start. “Why don’t we have a drink here first?” She stopped. She couldn’t believe those words had come out of her mouth.
That was what her mother had always said. Probably to save money. The suggestion had always struck Kate as tacky. Now here she was, saying the same thing. Not because they couldn’t afford it, though, but because it was just cozier to have cocktails at home.
“Swell.” Jack went to the kitchen. Kate followed him. “I should probably take a bath before we go.”
“Hell, if I have to take a bath, too, let’s go out big and romantic.” Jack mixed a vodka tonic for Kate and poured himself Scotch on the rocks. He brought the glasses into the small sun room off the kitchen.
“You’ll never guess who dropped by the Hall today.” Kate followed her husband into the room. They settled back on the overstuffed couch. The flowered chintz made the room seem warm and cheerful despite the dense fog whirling past the windows.
“How many guesses do I get?”
“None. I’ll tell you. Our two nun friends, Sister Mary Helen and Sister Eileen.”
“About that missing OWL friend of theirs?” Jack hit his forehead with the heel of his hand. “Jeez, I forgot to call Honore about that.”
Kate nodded, then sipped her drink. “I gathered as much. Too late now. I put in a call to him this afternoon. Poor unsuspecting slob said to have them call him on Monday.”
Jack smiled. “Wait till the guy gets a load of those two.”
“Oh, he did. Apparently Mary Helen couldn’t wait. The two of them went right over.”
“And Honore called you?”
“He nearly came through the phone, shouting ‘Why me? You know damn well this should go to cops at the Mission Station.’ I guess when I told him I had two older nuns, he thought he could sweet-talk them, calm them down. Charm them, actually. What he expected was sweetness and light.”
“And what he got was gangbusters!” Jack snorted.
Kate knew her husband was delighted. Don Juan Ron Honore had finally met his match. Not only would he be unable to charm these two woman, he would hardly be able to control them.
“What did he do with them?”
“What any normal, red-blooded police inspector would do. He gave right in and told them to come back if their friend wasn’t located within the next few days.”
Chuckling, Jack shook his head. “Damn, I wish I’d been there to see that ugly face!” He rose and took the two glasses for a refill.
“Should we?” Kate asked.
“A bird cannot fly on one wing alone,” her husband said and winked. “And that’s an Irish saying. A good Irish girl like you should know that and not have to be told by your Eye-talian husband.”
“How was your day?” Kate called after him. “And speaking of days,” she added before he could answer, “did you pick up something for your mother for Mother’s Day? It’s Sunday, you know.”
“Jeez, no.” Jack reappeared in the doorway and handed Kate her glass.
“Do you want to take her out for dinner or a fancy brunch or something like that instead?”
Jack ran his fingers through his thick, curly hair. “That reminds me, hon, Ma called at work today. Wants us to come to dinner at her place on Mother’s Day.”
“Isn’t that a little backwards? Shouldn’t the children be giving the party?”
Jack shrugged, then settled back beside her on the couch. “Whatever turns you on! Speaking of which…” He kissed her gently on the forehead.
Kate recognized the look on his face, but at the moment she didn’t feel a bit romantic. Jack sat back and looked at her. “Why the frown?”
“I was just feeling kind of sorry for your mother. Fixing her own dinner on Mother’s Day, and everything.”
“She loves it. Nothing makes her happier. Besides, she’s never satisfied with anyone else’s cooking. You know that.”
“Well, it’s not right.” Kate felt angry and she wasn’t sure why.
“What’s not right?”
“It just doesn’t seem very… very”-she sat up straight, searching for the right word-“appreciative.” She wondered for a moment whether her children-if and when she ever had any-would appreciate how much she wanted them. “And you’re so callous about it.” She glared at Jack, suddenly angry with him.
He shook his head. “I can’t figure you out. First you can hardly put up with my mother’s mothering. Now you’re mad because I’m not appreciative enough. Did I miss something?”
Sinking back down on the couch, Kate kicked off her shoes and pulled her legs up beside her. Jack had a point, she knew, and she felt a little foolish. Snuggling closer to him, she put her head on his knee. “Sorry, pal,” she said. His strong fingers kneaded her backbone. She had the sudden urge to purr.
“Didn’t that pamphlet say we should relax?”
Kate nodded her head.
“Let Dr. Bassetti introduce you to his foolproof method, lady. First let me check your vital signs.” His cool hand touched her forehead. “No fever.” He felt for her wrist. “Pulse steady.” Playfully, he patted her hip. “No apparent deformities. Dr. Bassetti recommends a romantic dinner for two, then plenty of bed rest with the aforementioned doctor.”
Kate giggled, then sat up. She felt suddenly warm and lovey. She wasn’t sure if it was Jack or the vodka on an empty stomach. “I’m so lucky to have you,” she said, pressing her lips against her husband’s ear. “And I always take my doctor’s advice. I’ll be in and out of the tub before you know it.”
Eyes closed, Kate felt the warm bath water ooze over her shoulders and relax them. The faint smell of strawberry bubble bath rose in the steam. Wriggling her toes, she slid farther down into the tub. The water licked at her chin. Without opening her eyes, Kate took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She imagined the tiny ripples it made on the surface of the bath water. She felt drowsy.
“You look like a bubble dancer in the final act.”
Kate’s eyes shot open. Jack stood by the side of the tub, smiling down at her. He had a glass of wine in each hand.
“What in the world?” Kate sat up in the tub. A few stray bubbles still floated around the sides.
“Dr. Bassetti has done some more research on your problem, lady. Maybe you won’t even need to see this busy gynecologist.” He set the wineglasses beside the tub. “If we are going to eat romantic, why not start romantic? In the movies the lead and his lady always take a bubble bath together, sip champagne, then send out for pizza.”
“And may I ask just how that would solve my problem?”
“Babies come from romance. It always looks real romantic.”
“That’s in the movies. And you’ve got wine, not champagne, plus we need a lot more bubbles.” Kate watched with trepidation as her husband took off his robe and climbed over the bottom end of the old-fashioned tub.
“I hope these claw feet will support both of us.” She eyed the legs holding up the tub.
“Wouldn’t that be something?” Facing her, Jack lowered himself into the water. “How about a little more hot water?”
Kate twisted, but couldn’t turn around enough to reach the faucet. Feeling his foot beside her hip, she giggled, then twisted some more, making room for his other foot. Now where would she put hers?
Slipping, grunting, and laughing, they both managed to fit into the narrow tub. Kate could feel Jack’s toenails against her back.
“Isn’t this romantic?” he asked, with a silly grin on his face. He bent over the side of the tub and picked up the two glasses. “People must have been smaller when they built this tub.”
Kate tried to sip her wine, but she banged her elbow on his knee. “Or maybe they didn’t see the same movies.”
By adjusting her hips she moved closer to her husband. She grabbed his waist with her heels. “Now what?” she asked and bent forward to kiss him. All she could reach was his nose.
“Ouch!” He’d cracked his elbow against the edge of the tub. “We better get the hell out of here.”
Kate started to laugh. She could feel Jack’s foot groping for a place to steady itself. It slipped off her thigh. “Are you afraid the legs are going to go?”
“No, I’m afraid we’ll get so stuck in this damn thing that the fire department will have to use jaws to get us out.”
Kate was laughing so hard she could hardly speak. “I wonder,” she said, “if the boys would also deliver the pizza.”