The Gossiping Gourmet

by Martin Brown

  “At least have a talk with Bradley about these hatchet jobs. I’m sure this woman, Barbara, is wondering what she did to have him set her up like this.”

  During his walk home that evening, Warren’s gossip column kept crossing Rob’s mind. In truth, he would happily toss Warren out of the paper’s circle of community reporters, but he knew that would equal a loss of readership and eventually a loss of ad sales, neither of which The Standard could afford. He resolved to leave the status quo for now but made a promise to himself to monitor Warren’s column more carefully. He’d start by reading it before putting it on press, and when possible, edit out comments he thought were inappropriate.

  Barbara remained willfully unaware that her social standing was quickly eroding. But one day, several weeks after Warren’s column about her had appeared, she went for a Saturday afternoon walk with Debbie Sirica and heard for the first time that she was not well thought of by many of the women in town.

  Debbie, who had been a longtime member of the league—in fact, she was a former chair of the holiday follies program—seemed shaken by this. “I was surprised to hear many of the women in the league referring to you as the ‘ice queen.’ When I asked them what they meant by that the only answer I got back was, ‘Well, actually, I didn’t say that, someone else told me.’”

  Further, when Debbie asked them to recall who they heard that from, she was told, “I really can’t remember,” which Debbie took to mean, “I don’t want to talk about this anymore; it’s not my problem.”

  Debbie was annoyed by all this nonsense. But, as she shared with Barbara, “I think they don’t like the fact that you’re a professional woman with more on your mind than holiday follies, cake sales, and silly gossip.”

  To Warren’s view, damaging Barbara’s social standing was the low hanging fruit. He was certain that greater care would need to be taken in what was written about her husband.

  It was difficult to control his urge to undermine Grant’s standing in town. As much as he prided himself on knowing all there was to know about fine food, music, and art, he was still envious. Warren could never hope to compete with either of the Randolphs’ credentials in the art world.

  This was made clear during the arts commission’s outing to San Francisco’s Legion of Honor to see the well-reviewed retrospective of the Danish-French impressionist Camille Pissarro. It was natural for the group to direct their questions to Grant—especially after he corrected Warren's faux pas in confusing Manet with Matisse.

  Another time, he corrected Warren, insisting, “No, that’s not a work by the American master John Singer Sargent. It’s the work of Anders Zorn, arguably Sweden’s greatest painter.”

  Catching the sly smiles of the others, Warren realized that his unquestioned position as a gentleman of culture and refinement was suddenly in doubt.

  Making matters worse, Grant had a physique envied by men and admired by women. His fitted shirt did little to hide his flat stomach, broad chest, and massive shoulders—all of which fueled Warren’s growing resentment.

  Warren’s one hope of dismantling this living statue of a man was that Alma and her Ladies of Liberty would in time believe that Grant was just as much of an outsider as his unappreciative wife. He enjoyed speculating with Robin Mitchell that perhaps the two of them were involved in the sale of forged artworks or other nefarious crimes.

  “What a delicious scandal that would be,” Warren told her, as his gray eyes lit up and his aging face broke into a smile. “Perhaps their home was purchased through the sale of forged paintings!”

  In time Robin Mitchell was repeating Warren Bradley’s privately spoken words of caution to others. At the Waterfront Beautification Association monthly meeting, she announced to a small group who hung on her every word, “Both of the Grants are a little full of themselves, don’t you think? These two immigrants from the cutthroat business of Manhattan art galleries should be approached with caution!”

  Chapter Nine

  Some of the storm warnings regarding their deteriorating social standing blew back to Barbara and Grant. Their concern, however, was always tempered by the Siricas’ advice not to take seriously the negative sentiments of small town folks with too much time on their hands.

  As much as Grant enjoyed his work with Sausalito’s small but very active arts community, and Barbara continued to frequently put on her laptop’s screen photos taken from their home’s patio, the town’s insular nature began to wear on both of them.

  She thoroughly enjoyed working with Anna Moss. The aging gallery owner still moved with boundless energy. Her passion reinvigorated all Barbara loved and missed about the world of art sales.

  Regularly, Anna would come to her with a digital portfolio of a new artist and ask her opinion. “Is he too daring for us?” was invariably Anna’s first question. “I think of our artists as a blend of different styles—all unique, of course, but they work well together; otherwise you’ll never be able to cultivate a collector to move from one artist to another.”

  Anna’s experience came through in everything she said and did.

  What Barbara enjoyed most was Anna’s urging her to share her opinion. “I want to know what you think, Mrs. Randolph. I have not met anyone more in tune with collectors than you.”

  Barbara equally enjoyed getting to know Anna’s forty-six-year-old son, James. She felt an attraction to him since the first day they met at the gallery.

  James, she soon learned, had divorced two years earlier. As he told her, “I doubt that I’ll ever find my true soulmate.”

  Barbara, ever the optimist, insisted, “None of us know what tomorrow might bring. The perfect woman for you might come walking through the gallery’s front door next week, and all your pessimism will vanish as if it never existed.”

  “What if that woman already walked in, and she’s you?” James asked in his half-teasing, half-serious fashion.

  James didn’t have the raw physical appeal of Grant, but he had a level of sensitivity that her husband had in short supply. James’ eyes were a remarkable blend of blue and green. His face was open and kind. And while it would have been impossible for her to explain, a small thrill went through her whenever he laughed and gently patted her hand.

  Watching Barbara and her son together, Anna told her privately one quiet afternoon, “Be careful my dear. When James wants, he can be very charming. He’s much more like his father than I had ever thought possible.”

  Barbara laughed. “James is wonderful, but I assure you, my Grant is man enough for me.”

  Still, as the commuter bus taking her home that evening crawled along the busy approach to the Golden Gate Bridge, Barbara found herself staring out the window and wondering what James would be like to hold in her arms. Would his kisses be tender? Would his lovemaking be a little less fierce, and hopefully more patient, than Grant’s?

  She had to admit a degree of curiosity. But she did not intend to ever follow her curiosity until, at a reception for the budding young geniuses that made up the Gate Six Artists’ Cooperative, she met Grant’s latest prodigy, Kitty.

  Twice during the evening event, she caught a glimpse of them sharing a joke. At one point, when Grant wandered off to another artist’s studio, Barbara made it a point to strike up a conversation with Kitty Collins.

  “We have two artists at the Moss Gallery in San Francisco where I work, who use a similar blend of colors and materials,” Barbara said, hoping to appear relaxed when she wasn’t. “You should come into the city one day, and we can have lunch.”

  Kitty seemed disinterested and distracted. “I should ask Grant if he’d like to go into the city with me. All three of us could have lunch together.”

  Everything Barbara disliked about Kitty doubled with that one comment.

  It didn’t help that she was ten or more years Barbara’s junior, with high cheekbones, ash tinted blond hair, exotic brown eyes, and breasts that were all but falling out of her snug white cotton dress.

  Call it
a woman’s intuition or just put it down to the glances she saw them exchange, but for the first time in many years, Barbara wondered if Grant had fallen victim to his once-substantial sexual appetites.

  Before coming to Sausalito, Grant had ended the distractions that frequently arose in their marriage whenever he found himself interested in another woman. Barbara was never sure if it was merely lustful curiosity, a playful nature, or a flirtation with more serious implications. After all, when she met Grant, he was involved with that alluring Jamaican woman.

  Barbara now wondered if his pursuit of the perfect physique had done more than renew Grant's interest in their shared lovemaking. Perhaps it had also sparked an appetite for new sexual conquests.

  There was a part of Barbara that desperately wanted to share her suspicions with Grant, but she couldn’t bring herself to do that, fearing she would appear both needy and insecure.

  When she arrived home after a busy Saturday at the Moss Gallery, she detected a scent and a presence in her home she’d never noticed before. As she wandered from room to room, she convinced herself that the scent was identical to the perfume worn by Kitty Collins.

  It was going on eight. Grant was not home, and there was no note and no cell phone message. Between the imagined scent and the disturbing image of Kitty’s overflowing breasts on the night of the artists’ reception, Barbara convinced herself that Grant was having an affair.

  A burning anger rose from deep inside her. She decided to extinguish that anger with a succession of ice-chilled margaritas. Barbara fell asleep on the couch, wondering if Grant and his pet had made love there as well.

  Mistakenly, Grant thought this Saturday was Barbara’s evening reception at the Moss Gallery for the opening of a new exhibit, which was actually scheduled for the following Saturday. So, when Ray mentioned that Debbie was spending the night up in Healdsburg with a girlfriend visiting from Chicago and suggested that they have a beer at his place after their workout, Grant thought for a moment, and then said, “Why not?”

  Ray threw a couple of steaks on the grill while the two men shared a couple of beers. It was a mild night, so they sat outside, swapping stories about some of the interesting characters that they had met at Golds. There was the guy who did deadlifts while releasing a grunt that could be heard across the entire gym. Another man who, both Ray and Grant agreed, must have dropped a weight on his head at some point was equally bizarre. He stopped them both in the locker room one afternoon and asked if they were a gay couple.

  Ray, not at all pleased by the question, replied, “Why the hell would you ask that?”

  The fellow looked down at the floor for a moment, trying to recall what gave him that idea, then looked up and said, “I don’t know. I guess it’s because I always see you both together.”

  “We share a ride, and we spot for each other when doing bench presses,” Ray said with obvious annoyance as he loudly shut his locker’s door.

  Grant, who was lacing up his shoes, avoided eye contact with either of them. Still, he chuckled to himself. He thought it made no sense for Ray to get irritated with a guy who struggled to utter a single coherent thought.

  By the time the steaks and a six pack of beer had been finished, and Ray had pulled out some very special Tequila Clase Azul for both of them to sample, and then taste again, Grant rose with some difficulty and announced: “Barbara should be back from her gallery reception by now.”

  “Want me to drive you home?” Ray asked.

  Grant shook his head. “It’s probably better if I walked. We don’t want Sausalito’s finest making you their big get of the night.”

  Ray nodded. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Besides, this isn’t New York or Chicago. The scariest thing you’ll run into in Sausalito late at night is a family of raccoons raiding a trash can.”

  It was close to midnight when Barbara awoke and called out to Grant.

  When there was no answer, she mumbled aloud, “He’s still not home! Where the hell is that louse?”

  She walked over to the kitchen counter where she had placed her cell phone earlier and started stabbing her fingers against the phone’s cold glass touchscreen. Bringing up her “favorite contacts,” she angrily pressed, “GRANT.”

  But her husband, who had left his phone on silent from the time he had entered the gym and then forgot to reset it during his time with Ray, was blissfully unaware of Barbara’s several attempts to reach him.

  A few minutes later, when he walked through the door in a relaxed but inebriated state, a ripened grapefruit flew past his head, hitting the back of the front door with a dull thud.

  Barbara shouted, “Where have you been, you bastard?”

  Grant’s fog-shrouded mind immediately sensed trouble. He knew he was under attack, but he was bewildered as to the cause.

  “Out late with your little whore girlfriend?”

  “WHAT? WHO?”

  “You heard me, you lying, cheating dirt bag!”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  Enraged, Barbara came rushing toward him. She was carrying an oversized hardcover coffee table book—a three-hundred-page retrospective on the work of Salvador Dali.

  Grant’s adrenaline surged. Wildly, he swung his right arm forward to block the book from striking the side of his head. He missed the book, but his powerful forearm cracked across Barbara’s lower left cheek and jaw, and sent her reeling backward and crashing to the floor.

  Barbara let loose with a bloodcurdling scream as she went down.

  The commotion woke their neighbors, the Andersons. Concerned, they called the Sausalito police department. It was after midnight. The town was as peaceful as an undiscovered tomb—a quiet that was shattered needlessly by two patrol cars, blue lights flashing, racing up Bulkley Avenue.

  The patrol officers, Hansen and Harding, knocked on the Randolphs’ front door less than three minutes after they were summoned.

  Grant, who had run to Barbara’s side to make a tearful apology, rushed to the door when he heard a deep booming voice say, “Sausalito police! Open up!”

  Reeking of beer, sweat, and tequila, Grant pulled open the door. Immediately, he muttered, “Everything is okay, officers.”

  “Sir, is that your wife on the floor?” Harding asked, “We’ll have to check on her condition.”

  He didn’t wait for Grant’s response. Instead, he strode to Barbara’s side. She was still laying flat on the floor. Looking up in a daze at the eager young faces of the two officers she heard them say, “Ma’am, are you alright? Do you need medical assistance?”

  On top of suffering from a surprisingly powerful hit, she had struck the back of her head when she hit the bare tiled floor. Barbara, whose head was ringing, responded groggily to the officers’ questions.

  Hansen called the fire department to send up the EMT crew.

  Meanwhile, Harding took out his handcuffs. Before Grant fully understood what was happening, he had been restrained and was being escorted out the front door.

  The officers drove him up to the county jail for processing on a charge of assault and battery.

  A stretcher was brought in, and in less than a clear voice, Barbara said she thought it was unnecessary to take her to the county hospital, Marin General. But the EMT officers insisted, explaining that it was a precaution whenever someone had suffered a blow to the back of the head.

  Oscar and Clarice Anderson, both in their early-eighties, watched in horror from their upstairs bedroom window as Grant Randolph was taken out in handcuffs, followed a short time later by his wife being taken on a gurney into the back of a Sausalito Fire Department medical transport vehicle.

  “Oh, my God!” Clarice exclaimed. “They seemed like such a nice quiet couple!”

  Oscar held his arm around his wife’s shoulders. “Looks can be deceiving, my dear.”

  They turned out their lights and returned to bed.

  Chapter Ten

  After Chris Harding and Steve Hansen’s retelling of the
midnight domestic violence call to the Randolph home, and after Alma insisted that Bradley use his “Heard About Town” column to call for Grant Randolph’s removal from the arts commission, Warren had few remaining options. He needed to act as the swift hand of public justice or risk losing most of his column’s biggest fans.

  He knew the why but was puzzled by the how. Then a thought occurred to him: Who might have overheard the Randolphs' battle and its aftermath?

  Late Monday he called Bea, a living Who’s Who of Sausalito’s small army of community volunteers. He asked her who lived on Bulkley Avenue next door to, or nearby, the Randolphs. Once he heard about Clarice and Oscar Anderson, he asked Bea if they were active on any of the town’s volunteer committees. Bea thought for a moment and recalled them both helping the library foundation prepare for their annual community book sale.

  Thirty minutes later, Warren was busy mixing up his irresistible cherry-fudge brownies.

  Oscar and Clarice knew Warren through his volunteer efforts but had never read his weekly column. Instead, when The Standard hit their mailbox every Wednesday, they gave the front page a quick glance and then dropped it into the recycling bin.

  The Andersons were a quiet couple who had lived in Sausalito for over forty years. They’d raised two children and were strict adherents to the rule of minding your own business.

  Early on Tuesday, they were surprised to find Warren on their doorstep with a platter of cherry-fudge brownies.

  “Warren, this is so nice of you!” Clarice declared as she welcomed him into her home. “Why the unexpected visit?”

  “Bea and I were talking about how helpful the two of you were in organizing those stacks of library books that had been removed from circulation and placed in the community book sale. I just thought it would be nice if I made you a batch of these yummy treats.”