by Alice Duncan
“You did sleep for a long time. That’s good, because you needed it. Here.” Pa pulled out a chair. “Why don’t you sit at the kitchen table, and I’ll bring you the bottle and the spoon? Sam is really worried about you. You might want to telephone him. I’m sure he’ll drop by as soon as he can.”
“Sam?” I spoke the name as if I’d never said it before.
“Yes, sweetie. And Pudge Wilson has already stopped by to see if there was anything he could do for you.”
It’s nice to know people cared. I kind of…well…this is a hateful thing to say, but I actually didn’t care at that particular moment. In fact, I’d as soon that car had done me in if life was aiming to be this excruciating for very darned long. Naturally I didn’t say so to Pa, who would have been aghast.
Instead I said, “How nice.”
Pa came back with the bottle and the spoon, set them on the table while he pulled out a chair for himself. Then I slowly and painfully removed the cork from the bottle and tried not to spill when I lifted the bottle—
“Let me do that,” said Pa, grabbing the bottle from my shaking hand. “Daisy, you must let people do things for you until you’re better. For pity’s sake, you need help. We’re here to help.”
To prove it, he poured out a spoonful of the vile syrup and held it—in his completely steady hand—in front of my mouth. I obediently opened same and swallowed the syrup. Then I shuddered because it tasted so bad. Then I yipped in agony. That shudder had been extremely painful.
Was I in bad shape, or was I not in bad shape?
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. Here, I poured you some coffee. Maybe that will drown the taste of the syrup.”
“Thanks, Pa,” I said in a disgraceful whimper.
Without even asking, Pa added sugar and milk to my coffee and lifted the cup to my lips. I managed to swallow a bit of coffee without dribbling. Again I said, “Thanks, Pa.”
“You’re more than welcome. And Mrs. Jackson came by last night with a plate of her famous beignets.”
“M-Mrs. Jackson? How’d she find out about my accident so soon?”
“Probably from Harold or Mrs. Pinkerton. Or from her son. Mrs. Jackson’s son, I mean.”
“Ah, yes. Of course.” Mrs. Jackson was the mother of Mr. Joseph Jackson, Mrs. Pinkerton’s gatekeeper. Mrs. Jackson not only made Voodoo jujus for people she liked, but she also made the most incredible pastries I’d ever eaten in my life, and that includes Vi’s. Mrs. Jackson’s beignets were…I don’t know. Magic or something.
Pa placed a plate with a pastry on it in front of me. I gazed down at the beignet and, for the first time in a long time, didn’t want to eat it. It’s true I’d nearly starved myself to death after Billy died, but I hadn’t had trouble eating since then. Until that day. Actually, truth to tell, I didn’t want to move my right arm or bend a finger for fear of the jolts of agony that would follow the movement. Pitiful.
“Eat it, Daisy,” said Pa, sounding stern.
“May I wait until I stop hurting so much? Even moving my right arm hurts.” And, since my left arm was strapped to my body, I couldn’t use that one at all. I didn’t point out this salient fact to my darling father.
“Of course you may. Didn’t mean to bully you,” said Pa.
“You’re not bullying me,” I said upon a shallowish sigh. I couldn’t even sigh deeply that day! And I’m an expert sigh-er. “You care, and I love you for it.”
Pa cut a piece of my beignet, forked it, and lifted it to my mouth. I obediently opened same and took the bite. Delicious. I closed my eyes and savored the flakiness of the pastry and the exquisite sweetness of it as I chewed.
Then somebody knocked at the front door, and I darned near fell out of my chair. Fortunately, Pa was there to steady me. Because of the volume of the knock and the way Spike took up his “Oh, goody, a friend has come to call” clamor, I suspected Sam.
I was right.
Using the handsome new cane I’d given him for Christmas, and after greeting my father and Spike, Sam walked into the kitchen, pulled out another chair, and sat on it with a thud. “They found the car,” were the first words out of his mouth.
I stared at him, feeling blank, although my various aches and pains were becoming less distinct. Then it was I realized that, not only was morphine syrup incredibly pain-relieving in and of itself, but it kind of blurred the edges of reality. No wonder people got addicted to the stuff.
“Did you hear me?” Sam demanded.
“Yes.”
Sitting himself in his own chair, Pa said, “Where’d they find it?”
“Angeles Crest.”
“That’s a long way away,” said Pa.
“Yeah,” said Sam. He squinted at me. “You okay, Daisy? You don’t look so good.”
What a charmer. “Thank you, Sam. Your assessment is correct. I don’t feel so good, either.”
“Figures,” said Sam, nodding. “You’re going to be in pretty bad pain for another week or more.”
“Goody gumdrops.”
“But get back to the car,” Pa said. “Who found it on the Angeles Crest?”
“A ranger who works at Mount Wilson. The machine had been abandoned near the observatory up there.”
“Do you know if it was a stolen car?” I asked. I still didn’t quite dare pick up a fork or break off a piece of that powdery beignet for myself. Regrettably, it looked as if Pa had forgotten he was in charge of feeding me that morning.
“Yes. It was reported stolen on New Year’s Day. A man named Randford called the police station to report that his 1923 Cole Sportster Sedan had been stolen from the driveway in front of his house. He lives in the San Rafael district.”
“My goodness,” said Pa. “That’s a rich man’s neighborhood.”
“It is,” I agreed, thinking of a woman named Mrs. Hastings for whom I’d conducted a séance a year or so prior, and who lived in the San Rafael area. That stupid séance had almost made me give up my work as a spiritualist-medium because a ghost actually had appeared, through me, at the séance. The poor guy had been murdered, so I didn’t blame him for being peeved about his demise, but he didn’t have to tell everybody about it through me, did he? Well…maybe he did, but his sudden vocal appearance had scared me almost to death.
“Yes, it is. Doan is the officer who took the report.”
“Doan had to work on New Year’s Day?” I said, feeling sorry for Doan, whom I’d known slightly for several years by that time.
“The police are on duty all the time, Daisy,” said Sam. “I’m lucky I got the day off.”
“I’m glad you did,” said I. “Heaven knows how I’d have got home if you hadn’t been there.”
With a smile that did a good deal to soften his granite-like surface, Sam said, “I suspect Pudge Wilson could have created a travois or a stretcher or something using his Boy Scout skills.”
“Good point,” I said with a little smile of my own. “That would have been two good deeds on one day, so he could have skipped today.”
Pa chuckled and Sam grinned.
“Anyhow,” Sam continued, “the car was found on the Angeles Crest, but it looks as if someone tried to wipe away any fingerprints. It’s a shame for Mr. Randford that the bears and raccoons took such an interest in it.”
“Oh, dear. What did they do? The bears and raccoons, I mean?” I asked.
“Tore up the seats and…well, let’s just say they did some intimate business on the car seats.”
“You mean they pooped on them?” I smiled, imagining a big brown grizzly bear sharpening his or her claws on a fancy new automobile’s interior seats and then doing his or her duty on the resultant fluffy stuff.
“You might say that,” Sam said in a voice as dry as mummy dust.
“Too bad,” said Pa, who didn’t seem as amused about the fun the bears and raccoons had enjoyed as I did.
But heck, anyone who can afford to live in the San Rafael hills and own a wildly expensive motorcar can probably afford to
get seats to said motorcar replaced. Mind you, that might be an unjust assumption on my part. Maybe the fellow was poor and only lived in the hills and had that luxurious automobile because…Well, I couldn’t think why a poor man would live in San Rafael or own a Cole Sportster. Not that it matters. I’m sure the guy was upset, and he had sufficient reason to be. If any old grizzly bear had ripped our Chevrolet to shreds, I’d have been irked, too.
“Has Mr. Randford reclaimed his automobile?” I asked.
“Not yet,” said Sam. “We’re still processing it.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we’re searching for any fingerprints that might not have been wiped off or anything else that might help us find the culprit who stole the machine and ran you down with it.”
“He didn’t actually run me down,” I said. “He ran me into a tree.”
Sam gave me a “Stop being so literal” grimace. Then he noticed the beignet on my plate and his eyebrows soared. Kind of like flying caterpillars. He had bushy eyebrows. “That looks good.”
“I’ll get you one,” said Pa, instantly rising from his chair and heading for the bread box.
“They are good,” I said, although I hadn’t yet touched mine and had only eaten the one bite Pa had sawed off for me. “Have it with some tea or coffee. These came straight from Mrs. Jackson, according to Pa. They’re her world-famous beignets.”
“World famous, are they?” Sam said as if he didn’t believe me.
“Perhaps only locally famous,” I admitted. “They’re the best pastries I’ve ever eaten in my life. Well, maybe Vi’s Scotch shortbread can match them, but I can’t think of anything else that can. Anyhow, does Scotch shortbread count as a pastry?”
“I have no idea,” said Sam.
“I think so,” said Pa.
“Thanks, Joe,” said Sam when Pa put a plate loaded with two beignets in front of him. Actually, “loaded” isn’t the right word. Mrs. Jackson’s beignets were so light, they’d probably float off the plate if they didn’t have so much confectioner’s sugar sprinkled on them.
Sam picked up his fork and dug into his beignet. Bravely daring, I also picked up my fork. That didn’t hurt too much, so I stabbed my beignet with it and managed to bring it away with a bite of beignet on it. By the time I got the bite to my mouth, I was reconsidering eating the rest of the thing. Doggone it! I was in agony!
Darn whoever it was who nailed me with that stupid car!
Five
It’s embarrassing to admit this, but Sam fed me the remains of my beignet. Then he carried me to the living room, where he settled me on the sofa, covered me with a lovely afghan my dear friend, Flossie Buckingham, had crocheted for me, set Spike on the sofa next to me, and said, “There. I’m going to bring in that bottle and spoon and, when you start hurting again, take some more of that syrup.”
“I don’t want to become—”
“You won’t become addicted to it, Daisy! Your pain will last a couple of weeks. Dammit, even you must recognize the difference between your circumstances and Billy’s.”
I glared at him resentfully. “What do you mean, ‘even I’? That was a nasty crack, Sam Rotondo.”
Naturally, Sam rolled his eyes at me. “Listen, I’m not casting aspersions—”
“Like heck,” I muttered.
Very well, so I was being almost as awful a patient as Sam had been. When I realized I was behaving badly, I tried to stop. Didn’t entirely succeed, but I tried.
Somebody knocked on the door, and Spike leaped off the sofa and began barking deliriously. Sam and I exchanged a glance, and Spike made it to the door just a bit before Pa did. Because Spike obeyed his humans, even humans other than me, he sat and stayed when Pa told him to. I adore that dog! He’s the only male being in my personal world who always does what he’s told to do.
“Miss Petrie!” said Pa, sounding surprised.
“Regina?” I was surprised, too.
“Yes,” said my favorite librarian in her soft, musical voice. “Robert and I heard what happened to Daisy, and I thought I should bring some books by, since she probably won’t be able to get to the library any time soon.”
“How very kind of you,” said Pa, opening the door wider and admitting not merely Miss Petrie, but her fiancé, Robert Browning (not the poet), as well.
“Regina and Robert!” I cried, feeling soppily emotional. “How nice of you to think of me.” Naturally their kindness brought tears to my eyes. I swear to heaven, I’m not generally as much of a wreck as I was those few first weeks in 1925.
“Daisy!” said Regina, hurrying over to the sofa. “And Detective Rotondo! How nice to see you here, too.”
I could tell by Robert’s dragging feet that he wasn’t as elated to see Sam as was his beloved. That’s because Sam had considered Robert a suspect in a murder case a couple of months prior to then.
“How do you do?” Sam said politely to Regina. “Good to see you, Browning,” he said to Robert. I was the only person to whom he was impolite, darn the man. Not casting aspersions, my foot.
“Oh, Daisy! I’m so sorry. You look awful!” Regina stopped in her tracks, slapped a hand over her mouth, and said, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean you look awful in that way. Only that you look as if somebody has beaten you to a pulp.”
Sam held up his hands in a gesture meant to deflect suspicion. “Wasn’t me,” said he.
Sam, Pa, Regina and Robert laughed. I didn’t. “It’s all right,” I told her. “I do look awful. I know I do, because I saw myself in the mirror this morning. With luck and a few weeks, all the scrapes and bruises will heal up and go away.” Because I didn’t want her to worry, I added, “And I’ll be well in plenty of time to make your wedding gown and the bridesmaids’ dresses.”
“I hadn’t even thought about that!” she cried as if shocked I had. “Daisy, don’t even think about sewing or working or anything right now. You need to get better before you worry about other things.”
“Absolutely,” said Sam. And Pa. And Robert. They made a nice trio. Sam was the basso profundo, Robert the tenor, and Pa was kind of baritone-ish.
“I hope these books will help you while away your recuperation time,” said Regina, sitting carefully on the sofa beside me. It was a long sofa, and I’m kind of short, so there was plenty of room for both of us. And Spike, who joined us on the sofa, sitting between Regina and me. He’d have liked to sit on my lap, but I warded him off. I don’t think he understood the reason for this rejection, but he obeyed me, bless his little doggy heart.
“Thank you. I—” My voice choked off, and I had to swallow tears. Really and truly, I’m not usually so pathetic. “I don’t think I can hold a book yet.”
“Oh, my goodness, I’m so sorry,” said Regina, genuinely compassionate. She loved to read, too, and understood how difficult it might be for a person not to be able to hold a book.
“Maybe there’s something on the radio that can keep you amused,” Robert suggested. I guess he and Sam had reached some kind of détente, because they sat next to each other on the piano bench. Pa drew up a chair, and he plunked himself into it so that we formed a kind of semi-circle.
“That’s a thought,” said Sam. “Do you know of any amusing radio programs?”
“I’d have to put on those ear things,” I told the huddled masses. “I think they’d hurt, even if I could move both of my arms to lift them over my head.” I’d purchased a radio-signal receiving set for my deceased husband approximately three years earlier, and Pa listened to it sometimes. I think he liked listening to baseball and football games. Neither of those things would amuse me, but I didn’t say so.
“I’ll bet the detective and I will be able to fix that for you,” said Robert, standing with a smile. “It’s easy to rig up a radio receiving set so more than one person can listen to it.”
“Really? I had no idea,” I told him, wondering if there might actually be something on the radio that would help relieve my boredom. Not that I�
�d had time to get bored yet. I was still dealing with agonizing pain. Added to which, right then I only wanted to close my eyes and sleep for a hundred years or so. Eating that beignet had worn me out.
“Perhaps I can read to you for a little while,” said Regina. She was such a kind woman.
“Why don’t you do that while Detective Rotondo—”
“Call me Sam,” said Sam, interrupting Robert. Impolite, I guess, but it was for a good cause.
“Very well. Why don’t you do that while Sam and I fix the radio? Daisy might like some of those stories in my collection.”
What collection was that? I didn’t have the energy to ask.
“Let me help, too,” said Pa. “I love stuff like that.”
Truer words were never spoken. Well, not often anyway. Pa was an inveterate tinkerer. He adored working on automobiles and pretty much every other kind of mechanical device a person could think of.
So the men walked off, leaving Regina and me on the sofa, me wishing I were asleep. I don’t know what Regina was thinking, but eventually she said, “I brought some books for you, Daisy. Since you can’t hold a book yet, let me read a little bit of this one.” She held up a book. I had to lift my head to see it, and that made me squeak a little in pain. Regina drew back. “Oh, Daisy! Don’t try to move. Just stay there.”
“Thank you,” I said, snuffling. I know I’ve said it before, but I honestly can’t believe how pitiful I was during those few days. Contemptible, even. Then I said something even more pitiful. “You know what I’d like to hear, if you really want to read to me?”
“What?”
“Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories. I know that sounds stupid—”
With a sweet smile, Regina said, “It doesn’t sound stupid at all. When I’m sick, I go back to the books I loved as a child.” Her smile tilted upside down. “But I didn’t bring a copy—”
“We have one,” I said, interrupting her. How rude, huh? Evidently interrupting people was rampant that day. “On the book shelf in the inglenook.” I’d have gestured toward the inglenook, but I didn’t dare.
Regina promptly rose from the sofa. “I’ll get it. Which story do you want first?”
