The Wedding Thief

by Mary Simses

  Lory told me she’d be in touch once I’d sent her the photos.

  Ginny Hall, the owner of Hall’s Florist, had pictures of her kids and dog tacked up on the wall behind the counter along with dozens of photos of flower arrangements. I told her what I’d told Lory, that I was Mariel’s sister and I was trying to help out.

  “Mariel seemed kind of stressed,” Ginny said as she unpacked a carton of ceramic pots. “Sometimes people don’t realize how much work an event like a wedding really is.”

  “That’s true. I see it all the time.”

  “What kind of changes does she want to make? I thought she was happy with the orchids and the calla lilies and—”

  “She was, but now she wants to tone things down a little, do something simpler, more low-key.”

  “Simpler. That was the simpler option. I couldn’t get her the orchids she originally wanted. They come from Ecuador, and my supplier is having problems right now. Some issue with customs. What she chose was the compromise.”

  Orchids from Ecuador. Trust Mariel to want those.

  Ginny picked up a pad and pen. “Does she have anything particular in mind?”

  “Oh, yes. She specifically said daisies and sunflowers. And maybe you could mix a few mums in there as well.” Mariel was allergic to all of them.

  There was a beat or two of silence. “Oh. That is a change. She seemed adamant about having orchids in the mix. Are you sure she doesn’t want to use any?”

  “I’m positive. As I said, she wants it low-key. Oh, and I’ll be bringing over the containers in the next few days.”

  “Containers?”

  “For the table centerpieces. Mariel picked them out herself. These really cute glass beer mugs. The flowers will look great in them.”

  On the way to Cecelia Russo’s house I called David and told him I hadn’t heard back from Miss Baird. “It’s been more than twenty-four hours,” I said. Which wasn’t that long, but we didn’t have any time to spare. “I think we need to escalate things.”

  “What are you suggesting?” David asked. “That we hunt her down?” He laughed.

  Maybe he thought I was kidding, but that’s exactly what was going through my mind. “Actually, yeah. I think we should drive up to her house. Today. Maybe she’ll be home. And we’ll have a better chance of getting her to help us if we talk to her in person.”

  I waited through several seconds of silence. Then: “All right. Let’s drive up there. I guess it can’t hurt.”

  I knew that meant he hadn’t been able to talk to Ana. I told him I’d call him when I got back to the inn and I drove the last mile to Cecelia Russo’s home.

  Cecelia lived in a stone mansion tucked behind a hedge of trees on Woodbine Grove. At one o’clock I rang the bell. Cecelia answered the door in a full-length orange silk shift, her black hair pulled back in a bun. At five foot ten, she towered over me.

  “Miss Harrington, I presume.”

  “Yes, it’s Sara. Thanks for seeing me, Mrs.—”

  “Miss.”

  “Miss Russo.” I followed her into a living room full of uncomfortable-looking antique French furniture. Three Grammy awards stood on the fireplace mantel. Photos of Cecelia with Zubin Mehta and Luciano Pavarotti, among other notables, dotted the top of a baby grand piano. I took a seat on a brocade-covered settee.

  “I thought your sister and I had agreed on what I was going to sing,” she said. “The Puccini and the Dvořák. What is it that she wants to change? And why?” She sat back in her chair, crossed her long legs, rested her hand on the arm, and began to drum her fingers.

  “Well, there’s a song she really loves. It’s meant a lot to her ever since she was young. And she told me she wanted you to sing it, but I guess she was a little shy about asking.”

  Cecelia’s head went back slightly, as if she couldn’t imagine anyone being shy about asking her anything. “What is the song?”

  She probably thought I was going to name something from an opera, The Marriage of Figaro, maybe, or Madama Butterfly. Or possibly a popular song, an old standard like “The Very Thought of You” or “All the Things You Are.”

  “It’s called ‘…Baby One More Time.’ It was Britney Spears’s first hit. Quite a few years ago.”

  “Britney Spears? She’s not an opera singer.”

  “No. She’s a pop singer. I guess that’s what you’d call her.”

  “I’ve heard of her. I don’t know her music, though. And I’m not familiar with the song. What did you say it’s called? ‘Baby’ what?”

  “‘…Baby One More Time.’ As I said, it was a big hit quite a while back. And it’s one of my sister’s favorite songs. Maybe even her favorite. It got her through some tough times. If you could please sing it…” I took out my phone. “I can show you on YouTube.” I brought up the music video and handed the phone to Cecelia. She took a deep breath as she watched the singer and her backup dancers cavorting around a school in their skimpy school uniforms, Britney mouthing the words and pouting at the camera.

  “And she wants this instead of the Dvořák?” Cecelia said, her upper lip curling.

  “Yes, she does. It would mean the world to her to hear this at her wedding.”

  It seemed like Cecelia Russo, with all of her awards and accolades, her PhD from Juilliard, and the thousands of hours she’d probably spent singing Mozart and Beethoven and Verdi and Wagner, wasn’t about to stoop low enough to sing “…Baby One More Time.” I wouldn’t have if I were her.

  I was about to tell her to forget it, that the Dvořák would be fine, when she thrust her shoulders back, raised her chin, and said, “I’ll do it. But don’t expect me to dance.”

  Chapter 11

  ¡Viva la Revolución!

  I returned to the inn, and not long after, David and I carried the sculpture to the van and headed toward Eastville to find Miss Baird. As the road meandered past a hillside of grazing cattle, David turned on the radio and a song began, something I recognized. A couple of bars with a few quick piano notes, then the metallic clank of an accompanying cowbell. The piece would build to more percussion and eventually a saxophone and vocals.

  “‘Compared to What,’” I said as David muttered the same thing.

  We looked at each other and smiled.

  “Swiss Movement.” I named the album.

  “Montreux Jazz Festival,” he added.

  “From the sixties.”

  “That’s right,” he said. “So you’re a jazz fan too?”

  “Ever since I was a kid.”

  He turned up the volume. “Eddie Harris and Les McCann.”

  “With Benny Bailey, Leroy Vinnegar, and Donald Dean,” I said.

  He looked at me, his mouth open. “Wow. You win this week’s music quiz, Miss Harrington. You get a set of steak knives and an electric can opener.”

  I laughed. “Great. I can use them.”

  “How did you get interested in this old stuff?” he asked.

  “Mostly through my dad.” I thought about his music collection, boxes and boxes stored in the back of the guest-room closet. The CDs had been digitized long ago, but the albums and cassette tapes just sat there.

  “He was the Broadway guy, the producer, right?”

  “Yeah, the producer. He had all these old albums and CDs. Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Dave Brubeck, Duke Ellington. And tons of Great American Songbook stuff. That’s my favorite kind of music. The Gershwins, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern. That whole era. He had it covered. I felt like I grew up with those guys. I used to go around the house singing their songs when I was a kid. I even sang ‘You’re the Top’ in the fifth-grade talent show.”

  “You didn’t.” He grinned.

  “Oh, I did. Other kids were doing the B-52s or Wilson Phillips. And I was doing Cole Porter.” I cringed, picturing myself as I pantomimed the lines. Wavy hand motions for the phrase about the Nile; listing to the side for the Tower of Pisa reference.

  “I bet it was cute. Any videos around?” His eyes
had a mischievous glint.

  “Not that anyone will ever see. Thank God there was no social media back then.” I glanced out the window as we passed a lake where two boaters skimmed their kayaks over the water. “What about you? How did you get interested in jazz?”

  “Me? I used to play the saxophone. A long time ago.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Why do you look so surprised?”

  “I don’t know. I guess you just don’t seem like a sax guy.”

  He recoiled, pretending to be insulted. “What do you mean? What’s a sax guy supposed to seem like?” He glanced around the van as though one might be in the back seat.

  “I don’t know. You just seem like a real estate guy.”

  “That’s because you know I am one. But that doesn’t mean I can’t also be a sax guy.” He put on his hurt expression again.

  He was right. I shouldn’t have prejudged him. “Okay, all right. You’re a sax guy. Tell me about it. Did you play for a long time?”

  “Long enough to have a jazz band in high school. We were called…you ready for this?” He paused. “Jazzmatazz.”

  “Jazzmatazz?”

  “I know. Pretty lame, right?”

  “Actually, I kind of like it,” I said. “What happened? You didn’t stick with it?”

  “Oh, I stuck with it for a while. All through college and a few years after I got out.”

  I tried to imagine David as a musician. Late nights in a basement club in a college town, brick walls, the floor sticky from spilled drinks, the air heavy with the odor of beer, David blowing the lid off his sax. I kind of liked the image.

  “But I wasn’t really going anywhere,” he said. “I don’t think I wanted it enough. And then a friend of mine’s father who had a commercial real estate business told me if I got my license, he’d hire me. Seemed like a better way to make money at the time. Although I sometimes wish I’d never given up music.”

  I wondered what he missed about it. Playing before an audience or jamming with other band members? Or maybe just sitting alone in a quiet room, filling the space with notes? What magic that had to be. Perhaps he missed all those things.

  “I think it’s wonderful that you have a talent for music,” I said. “I always wished I could sing. I mean really sing. But I don’t have a good voice. You have the talent. You shouldn’t waste it. You should keep playing. I love the sax. I bet you’re great on it.”

  “Not anymore. You wouldn’t want to hear me play these days.”

  A Dexter Gordon tune came on. I couldn’t remember the name, but David identified it as “Cheese Cake” and told me he was taking back the electric can opener and the steak knives.

  “I think we’re here,” David said, and I looked up to see a sign that said ENTERING EASTVILLE.

  I felt a sudden stab of doubt. “Maybe Miss Baird won’t remember me.” I hoped I hadn’t dragged him all this way for nothing.

  We turned onto a narrow, heavily wooded road and after we’d traveled almost a mile with no houses or driveways in sight, the GPS announced we had arrived at our destination. David stopped the van and we looked around.

  “Where are we?” I said. There was nothing but trees.

  “No idea.” He glanced at the GPS again. It showed the car as a dot and our destination as another dot, but the background was solid white and there was nothing connecting the dots. It was as if we were floating in space.

  “Wait, what’s that?” On the right a dirt road, barely more than a path, sloped upward at a sharp angle; there were tufts of wild grass growing between tire tracks and ruts carved like hieroglyphics into the ground. “Could that be the driveway?”

  “You think we’re supposed to go up there? In this?”

  “I don’t see anything else.”

  He looked around again and took a deep breath. “I guess I’ll have to pretend I’m in my Range Rover.”

  He turned the van onto the path and we began to climb the hill, the van scrambling over rocks and ruts, stones and boulders grinding under the wheels, tree branches snapping against the windows. We bounced and jostled our way to the top.

  The woods opened into a clearing and in the middle stood a two-story cottage, yellow with turquoise trim. Roofing and gables and dormers jutted out randomly, and little windows appeared in unexpected places. It looked as though the house had been an experiment by someone who hadn’t made it through architecture school. A giant rainbow in pastel shades and a huge golden sunflower were painted on the front. The shrubs and ferns that grew tall and wild around the perimeter of the house had clearly never heard the whine of a weed whacker or seen the glinting edge of a scythe. Crows danced across the scruffy lawn.

  “I guess we’re here,” David said, sounding hesitant. He turned off the engine. “Maybe we should keep the hand in the van for now. If we don’t like the looks of things, we can leave.”

  I agreed. It seemed like a good plan.

  We tramped across the grass to a small porch on the right side of the house. There was a stone bust of a young man in the corner. Broad nose, thick neck, long hair. Not an attractive face, but an interesting one. And the piece was beautiful in its execution, detailed and lifelike.

  “I wonder if Miss Baird made that,” I said, moving closer to get a better look.

  “If she did, she’s good,” David said. “Really good.”

  A lantern hung over the door. Several wind chimes nearby attempted to respond to a slight breeze. A large bell with a rope attached was mounted on the wall, the kind of bell you’d see in an old Western movie. Someone would ring it at mealtime, and the ranch hands would come running.

  “I guess that’s the doorbell?” I looked at David.

  He grabbed the rope and gave it a pull, which sent the bell into a clanging frenzy that made us jump. David reached out and grasped the clapper to silence it.

  A moment later we heard a woman’s voice. “Coming, coming.” And then the door opened, and Miss Baird appeared.

  Her hair, styled in a long braid, had turned silver-gray and was streaked with white. Her loose-fitting T-shirt covered a sizable paunch, and her flowy cotton skirt fell to midcalf, revealing a crescent-moon tattoo on her right ankle. She wore beaded leather sandals and held a small paper bag.

  “You’re the Howleys?” Miss Baird looked us up and down as though we weren’t the type of people she’d been expecting.

  “Excuse me?” David said.

  She stepped onto the porch. “You’re here to pick up the psyllium?” She held up the bag. “Psyllium husks? Constipation? You said you needed something for constipation.”

  David and I exchanged a glance. “No, we’re not constipated,” I said. At least I wasn’t. “You’re Jeanette Baird, right? I mean Jeanette Gwythyr.”

  Her forehead wrinkled. “You’re sure you’re not the Howleys?”

  I almost laughed. “I don’t think so.” I turned to David. “Are we?”

  “I wasn’t a Howley when I woke up this morning.”

  I did laugh then, but Jeanette didn’t seem to think it was funny. Or didn’t understand we were joking. “You’re not from the government, are you? You’re not tax people?” She took a step back, her eyes darting from me to David.

  This wasn’t going the way I’d planned.

  “No, we’re not from the government,” David said. “We’re here because—”

  “I know all about how they spy on people. They do it through their computers. I always unplug mine when I’m not using it.” She stared across the yard at the woods, as though there might be IRS agents hiding there. “We pay our taxes!” she shouted at the trees.

  “Please let me explain,” I said. “I’m Sara Harrington. And this is David Cole. I grew up in Hampstead and I was in your three-D art class at Hampstead High. Back in 2000.”

  She pulled in her head like a turtle and squinted at me. “In 2000? That’s the year Cadwy and I got married.”

  “Yes, I know. I remember. I was a senior. We all knew you as M
iss Baird, though.”

  “You were in one of my three-D classes?”

  I nodded.

  She studied my face, scrutinizing me. Then she said, “No. I don’t remember you.”

  “Maybe you’d remember Christy Costigan. Tall, long red hair. Always spent her free time in the art rooms. She made a huge cat out of clay. Siamese. It was fantastic.”

  “A Siamese cat?” Jeanette shook her head. “I don’t recall that.” But a moment later she held up her hand. “Wait, the redhead. I know who you’re talking about. She had a funny voice. Kind of like gravel.”

  “Exactly. I sat right next to Christy.”

  “That was a long time ago. I really don’t remember you.” She nodded toward the door. “But come on in anyway. I can’t stand out here all day. I’ve got a bad knee. Ever since that march to save the teak trees last fall.”

  “We’d love to come in, but we need to get something from the car,” I said.

  Jeanette peered at the van. “That gas guzzler over there’s yours?”

  “It’s not mine,” David said, sounding a little defensive. “I had to rent it to bring the—”

  “He usually drives a Range Rover,” I added, realizing too late that that wasn’t going to help things.

  “Actually, my Range Rover is fairly fuel-efficient,” David said. “It’s a diesel.”

  Jeanette gazed skyward. “Tell that to the ozone layer.”

  David and I walked to the van, debating whether we should ask her to fix the hand. “She seems a little odd,” he said. “I don’t think we should do it.”

  I glanced back to see Jeanette throwing birdseed on the lawn. “That sculpture’s fantastic, though. And we’re already here. Let’s see what she has to say.”

  He shot me a look like he couldn’t believe he was going along with the idea, and then he opened the back doors of the van and we pulled out the bubble-wrapped hand with its four crushed and bent fingers.

  “What in the world…,” Jeanette muttered as David and I carried the hand across the yard and onto the porch.