66
The answer was a bit of romance, followed by a wedding.
Not my own, alas.
Sharice reminded me that Glad and Miss Gladys were getting married at noon on Saturday in the gazebo in the Old Town Plaza. So we walked downtown and spent the night in my residence at the back of Spirits in Clay.
Benz was a bit out of sorts; Savannah cats don’t handle change well. It was probably just my imagination, but Geronimo seemed to have a smirk on his snout.
I marinated a thick fillet of mahi-mahi in cumin and lime, then grilled it along with an ear of corn and some sliced red onions. I cut the fish into chunks and made fish tacos with corn kernels scraped from the cob, grilled red onion, diced avocados and a final spritz of lime juice.
We ate on the patio surrounded by the high adobe wall and the chamisa.
Then we left Benz and Geronimo on the patio (there being no terrace at Sprits in Clay) and drew the curtain so that they would not be embarrassed by our behavior.
We slept late the next morning. Knowing Sharice would not enjoy the coffee I brew, we walked across Central to the Central Grill and Coffee House, where Sharice had a latte and I had the house brew black. She had one of their house-baked scones. I had two.
We had just settled back in at Spirits in Clay when Tristan arrived. “I’m starting a new career as a wedding planner,” he said, and handed us a large package. “See you soon.”
The package contained two pairs of hiking boots, two pairs of cargo shorts, two floppy broad-brimmed canvas hats and two bright yellow T-shirts with glad and gladys become even gladder printed horizontally and the date printed vertically in bright red so that the shirts mimicked the state flag. But the most surprising thing in the package was the instruction that we were to wear this getup to the ceremony.
“Do you suppose this is a joke?” I asked Sharice.
“Are you hoping it is?”
“Yes. You know I always wear long pants because I don’t like the sun on my legs.”
“And you have skinny legs.”
“Well, that too. But I’m light brown to begin with and darken quickly in the sun.”
“Great. If you get real dark, I’ll take a snapshot of you and send it to Dad.”
“Funny,” I said, and donned the ridiculous outfit.
Sharice, on the other hand, looked terrific in shorts because of her long, sinewy legs. But the hat looked as weird on her as the shorts looked on me, as she agreed when she looked into the mirror.
One of the invited guests, Faye Po, had explained that the Chinese tradition is that gifts are always given by older people to younger people. Glad and Gladys had adopted that practice and specified that there be no presents. The clothes for the wedding were their presents to the guests.
We all gathered in front of Felipe de Neri shortly before noon and were joined by a mariachi band. Fortunately, they were dressed in the traditional trajes de chorro. Seeing someone in cargo shorts and a T-shirt playing a guitarrón would have verged on cosmic dissonance.
The mariachis played “Las Mañanitas” as they led us around one full circle of the plaza and then up to the gazebo. Glad and Gladys were followed by her son, Zachary, who was best man, and her daughter, Sarah, who was the bridesmaid. The other guests were Faye Po and her house boy, Diego; Martin Seepu; Tristan; John and Susan Hoffsis and John’s father, Jim from the bookstore; Dr. Batres and the rest of the staff from his clinic; Susannah; the priest and several parishioners from Miss Gladys’s home church, St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Nob Hill; and Whit Fletcher, whom Gladys adores.
Had we been Shriners wearing fezzes and riding scooters, we wouldn’t have attracted more stares than we did in our cargo shorts and colorful tees. We encircled the gazebo, and a crowd of tourists encircled us.
A lady behind me whispered to her husband, “Do you think this is a Native American ceremony?”
“Who knows,” he replied, “and what’s the deal with the guy in the cut-off robe?”
The guy in question was Father Groas, who had shortened one of his old robes (using a kitchen knife, judging by the ragged hem around his waist) and was wearing cargo shorts and hiking boots. As he recited the opening prayer, I sent one heavenward myself, beseeching the Almighty not to allow anyone to take a picture of the priest.
Despite the costumes, the ceremony was traditional, with Glad and Gladys promising “to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health; to love, cherish, and to obey till death us do part.”
After Father Groas announced them man and wife, the mariachi band played and sang “Contigo Aprendí”:
Contigo aprendí a ver la luz del otro lado de la luna
Contigo aprendí que tu presencia no la cambio por ninguna
Aprendí que puede un beso ser mas dulce y más profundo,
Que puedo irme mañana mismo de este mundo,
Las cosas buenas ya contigo las viví
Contigo aprendí que yo nací el día que te conocí.
I sang along sotto voce in English for Sharice:
With you I’ve learned to see the light behind the moon
With you I’ve learned that I wouldn’t change you for anyone else
I’ve learned that a kiss could be bigger and deeper
That I may leave this world tomorrow
Because I’ve already lived the best things with you
And with you I’ve learned that I was born the day I met you.
The band then switched back to “Las Mañanitas” and led us to the reception in Moreno Hall at Felipe de Neri, where another surprise awaited us. The dishes in the buffet line were Emma’s tuna, summer squash pie, King Ranch chicken, seven-layer Mexican dip, veggies and grits, dolmades casserole, Irish casserole and spaghetti pie.
It seems the ladies of St Mark’s all have Miss Gladys’s casserole recipes and had prepared them for the reception.
While I dithered, everyone else grabbed a plate and filled it with mounds from each dish.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” asked Sharice.
“I had two scones this morning,” I reminded her.
She joined the line and eventually returned with a plate of veggies and grits for her and some seven-layer Mexican dip for me. If you don’t think of it as Mexican food, it actually tastes good. And paired well with the cold Dos Equis on offer.
By the time the crowd began to thin out and the happy couple left for their honeymoon, the casserole dishes were empty and the beer was all gone.
Susannah, Tristan, Martin, Sharice and I cleaned up the hall, then walked over to Dos Hermanas, where we were relaxed enough to kick around what had happened at the university.
Susannah pointed at me and said, “Let me do the sleuthing from now on.”
“I wasn’t sleuthing. I just went by Shorter’s office to say goodbye.”
Tristan said, “Just in the nick of time, I’d say,” and we all laughed.
I asked Susannah what Helen Shorter told her while they were seated on the floor.
“She figured out her brother had framed her. He asked her to meet him in his office on the day of the body cast event. When she arrived, there was another woman in his office. From the description Helen gave, it was Jollo Bakkie. Helen waited in his outer office for half an hour and then left. When she was arrested, the police told her they knew she was in the building on the day Ximena was murdered. She realized he had asked her to come merely so people would see her there. Then the police found the squeeze bulb with traces of cyanide on the inside and Ximena’s nasal mucus on the outside. She knew her brother worked with cyanide. And had a key to her house. After she made bail, she went to confront him. She got there just as he was aiming his pistol at you. She shot him through the glass wall without even thinking about it.”
“Since she was carryi
ng a pistol,” I said, “my guess is she was going there not merely to confront him but to shoot him.”
Susannah shrugged. “She said she has a carry permit and always has her pistol with her.”
“Why?”
“Because she can’t yell for help.”
We were silent for a few seconds.
“Lucky for me,” I said.
“And for her,” said Tristan.
“Why?”
“Because I think your guess was right. She went there to kill him. And she did. But because you were there, she walks. According to the law, what she did is justifiable homicide. She killed him to save your life.”
Susannah said, “She also asked me to tell you something.”
“What?”
“She signed that she was a friend because she didn’t want you to think she was going to shoot you too. But that doesn’t mean she’s changed her mind about you. Your refusal to recognize signing as a genuine language is an act of oppressing a minority.”
Tristan asked Sharice if she thought the refusal of most schools to recognize ebonics as a language was an act of suppressing the black minority.
She made a sound that might qualify as a scoff. “The people who pushed that claimed English is our slave language. In one sense, that’s correct. My ancestors learned English only because they were taken as slaves to an English-speaking place. But other Africans were taken to Cuba, Brazil or Suriname and their descendants now speak Spanish, Portuguese or Dutch. Language didn’t enslave us. People did that. We’ve risen out of slavery. So how is speaking English like ignorant white people supposed to help? To me, blacks in the diaspora have only two legitimate choices: Embrace the language of the place you happen to be born and speak it even better than everyone else. Or learn the African language of your distant ancestors. Anything else is just street politics.”
“Or you could do both,” said Martin.
“Yes,” Sharice said, “that would be even better. It speaks well of your people that you have retained your language.”
“Some of the young people don’t understand that. They are immersed in popular culture with their phones.”
“You should do what Uncle Hubert did with his class,” said Tristan. “Take their phones away.”
Angie showed up to take our order, and we all ordered margaritas.
“You don’t drink spirits,” I said to Sharice.
“I do to celebrate something special.”
“Yes. That wedding was indeed special,” I said.
“That’s not what I’m referring to” she replied. “Stand up,” she commanded.
I did. She stood up, wrapped those long arms around me and kissed me passionately.
Everyone in the place applauded.
“The special occasion is you being alive,” Sharice said.
“It’s like you got a reprieve,” Tristan observed.
“And I should make the most of it,” I said. I dropped down on one knee, Sharice’s hand still in mine. “Marry me.”
More applause from the crowd and shouts of “Say yes!”
Sharice teared up. “You know I love you, Hubie. And I want to be with you forever. But marriage is … I mean my father … uh …” She looked to our friends at the table. “I could use some help here.”
Martin spoke. “There’s a quote from Lao-Tzu that might help.”
“You know Asian philosophy?” Sharice asked.
“I am Asian,” he said with a smile. “My people came to this land across the ice bridge from Asia.”
“He falls back on the land-bridge theory when it’s convenient,” I said, my knee beginning to hurt.
“What’s the quote?” Sharice asked.
“He who speaks does not know. He who knows does not speak.”
“Perfect,” she said.
About the Author
J. Michael Orenduff grew up in a house so close to the Rio Grande that he could Frisbee a tortilla into Mexico from his backyard. While studying for an MA at the University of New Mexico, he worked during the summer as a volunteer teacher at one of the nearby pueblos. After receiving a PhD from Tulane University, he became a professor. He went on to serve as president of New Mexico State University.
Orenduff took early retirement from higher education to write his award-winning Pot Thief murder mysteries, which combine archaeology and philosophy with humor and mystery. Among the author’s many accolades are the Lefty Award for best humorous mystery, the Epic Award for best mystery or suspense ebook, and the New Mexico Book Award for best mystery or suspense fiction. His books have been described by the Baltimore Sun as “funny at a very high intellectual level” and “deliciously delightful,” and by the El Paso Times as “the perfect fusion of murder, mayhem and margaritas.”
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this book or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2018 by J. Michael Orenduff
978-1-5040-4992-4
Published in 2018 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
180 Maiden Lane
New York, NY 10038
www.openroadmedia.com
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