Praise Her, Praise Diana

by Anne Rothman-Hicks

  Jane wondered if she was imagining the chiding tone in Ellen’s e-mail but decided she was just being paranoid and maybe feeling a little guilty (Thanks, Martha!) for taking the day without letting people know ahead of time. Certainly, it didn’t seem fair of Ellen to suggest that Jane and Maggie had some sort of obligation to return to the gallery Friday night, and she didn’t feel like having an awkward telephone conversation about it. She sent a reply e-mail instead, assuring Ellen that she could come in on Tuesday, and left it at that.

  Afterward, Jane kept busy for a couple of hours responding to lawyers and clients on pending cases, drafting some legal papers, and scheduling a new client to come in to see her next week. One of the phone messages was from Rosita, who had contacted her to say that she no longer wanted to go through with the second demonstration they had planned for the following Tuesday morning at Jose’s Precinct. It seemed like a mistake, given the amount of publicity that they had received and the number of women who had shown up. Jane returned her call to try to convince her, but she was routed into voice-mail when Rosita didn’t answer.

  Around eleven, a second e-mail arrived from Ellen that went out to all the members of the WPW board, thanking everyone for their help the night before and reiterating (somewhat defiantly) that she intended to stick to the original schedule of the exhibit and that whoever had signed up to help tonight would still be needed. She also asked for a special meeting of the board to decide whether Sheila should remain as chairwoman in light of her and her cohort’s attempts to sabotage the exhibit.

  This was a confrontation that Jane had expected. She only wondered if Ellen had talked to other members of the board to gather support. Jane kept this second e-mail as new but did not respond.

  Later in the morning, Detective Smalley left a message.

  “I visited Maureen O’Reilly today, and she said I should talk to you. Please give me a call.”

  Jane telephoned Maureen first, and got the response she’d expected. Maureen was adamant that she would not talk to Detective Smalley about Diana or what she thought she saw at the exhibit, with or without her lawyer present. Jane called Smalley and told him.

  Smalley was quiet a moment. When he spoke, he didn’t sound angry, just weary.

  “Did you know that a grand jury has been convened to investigate Diana?”

  “I didn’t know specifically, but I’m not surprised.

  “The grand jury could subpoena Maureen.”

  “Well, I hope they don’t because she won’t testify. She told me this already. What are they going to do, put an old woman in jail for contempt?”

  “It wouldn’t be my recommendation,” Smalley said. “But the Assistant District Attorney assigned to the matter is very ambitious. I can’t predict what’s going to happen. And who knows if there wouldn’t be support for some aggressive action. Not everyone thinks this Diana is some sort of hero.”

  “Just the half of the population that’s made up of women?”

  “I hope not,” Smalley said. “That would make things even more difficult.”

  “You saw what happened to Jose Torres,” Jane said.

  “How did you know about that?” the detective asked sharply.

  “I was at the demonstration. I helped organize it. Didn’t you know?”

  “Sorry. Of course I did,” Smalley said then. “I thought you were talking about something else.”

  “Did something else happen to him?”

  Smalley hesitated. “This is not general news yet, so I would appreciate your not spreading it around. But his precinct got a call from Jose this morning. He said he had been kidnapped by a group of women who were holding him.”

  “Can’t they trace incoming calls?”

  “It was a recorded message sent from a payphone.”

  “That’s unbelievable.”

  “Yes. And you can see why an ADA might be willing to subpoena even an old lady if she thought she could learn something.”

  “Tell the ADA that Maureen’s not playing with a complete deck, Detective Smalley.” Quickly, Jane recounted her interview with Maureen, emphasizing the part in which Maureen likened Diana to appearances of the Virgin Mary. “Even if she gave up a name to the ADA, there would be no way of really knowing if she weren’t just dreaming.”

  “As I said,” Smalley replied. “I’m just the cop on this one. I don’t call the shots in the Grand Jury.”

  * * * *

  A little before noon, Maggie took a break from her yard work and came upstairs to see Jane. The front of her coveralls was coated with dust and leaves, the latter of which had made their way into her hair as well, intertwined with the golden strands like the garland of a woodland nymph. Somehow she had found the time to make a fresh pot of coffee, which she carried on a tray along with one of the rolls baked that morning and set on the desk beside Jane.

  Jane took Maggie’s hand and kissed it.

  “You’re taking awfully good care of me.”

  “I’m still just paying you back for what you’ve done for me,” Maggie said. “I hope you’ll let me take you out to a restaurant later for dinner. There are a couple of nice places not too far away. One is in an old mill that is very pretty.”

  “Do they like women in coveralls?” Jane asked.

  Maggie looked down at herself and then at Jane.

  She grinned. “You have a point there. Maybe we’ll stay in until we have the clothes to eat out in style. What would you like?”

  “How about Italian? But something simple. Spaghetti carbonara, maybe? A salad?”

  “Garlic bread?”

  “I love garlic bread.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  By the time Maggie got back from town, Jane was ready to quit office work for the day. After a sandwich for lunch, she helped Maggie clear away brush and leaves and generations of weeds from around two of the small outbuildings behind the barn, then bring the debris to a compost pile.

  While they worked, Maggie told Jane what she had planned for the place. First, she would get just a couple of goats; enough to have her own supply of butter, yogurt and cheese and learn how to properly care for them. The front and back pasture could handle a total of twelve goats, which ultimately would provide milk enough to sell cheese and yogurt to the local restaurants, or perhaps in the greenmarkets in New York City. One of the outbuildings was an old chicken coop that just had to be cleaned thoroughly and have its windows patched in places to be useable. Fresh eggs were always in demand. There was also plenty of room for a larger garden that would supply most of the vegetables and spices she would need. The basement was perfect for drying spices for the winter. What she couldn’t use herself, she would barter for with her neighbors.

  “It sounds like a lot of work,” Jane said.

  “It is. Once you get animals, it becomes a full time proposition. They can’t milk themselves.”

  “Are you ready for that?”

  Maggie paused, cocked her head slightly.

  “I’m not sure. But I can imagine circumstances when it would be a kind of bliss.”

  They worked hard together all Friday afternoon. The day turned warm with a full sun, and they were both coated with dust and sweat by the time they quit. Maggie took a quick shower first since she said that she had a “surprise” with dinner. By the time Jane had pulled on a fresh pair of coveralls and joined Maggie downstairs, there was a tablecloth on the dining room table, along with nicely folded cloth napkins, silverware, water glasses and wine glasses. A pair of candles waited to be lit.

  “Ta da!” Maggie said, with a flourish, gesturing toward her handiwork.

  “It’s beautiful,” Jane said. “Better than any restaurant. And who knows, maybe this place could be a restaurant. Another way for us to make money out here.”

  Maggie looked at Jane for a moment.

  “Maybe,” she said. “Let’s just mix up the carbonara and toss the salad. We’re ready to eat. But can we do one thing first?”

  “What’s tha
t?”

  “Can we turn off our cell phones, and unplug the land line too? And I was wondering what it would be like to go without electric lights for the rest of the evening. I have loads of candles and candlesticks. Would you like to try it?”

  “Of course.”

  It was a very pleasant dinner. Maggie had bought two bottles of wine, a Chianti Classico and a Barolo. They alternated these, glass after glass, trying to decide which the better choice was and finally agreed that it was a toss-up. At Jane’s urging, Maggie told her more about her plans for the farm. An older couple owned the adjoining property on her north, and when they moved into a retirement community they promised to sell her a few acres at a good price. She hoped to put in some solar panels on the roof and a small wind turbine to become as self-sufficient as possible. That was the ultimate goal—to be free of the world and its entanglements.

  While they were clearing the table, Jane told Maggie about the call with Smalley, and the strange message she had gotten from Rosita.

  “Do you think Rosita knew about Jose being kidnapped?” Maggie asked. “I mean before it happened?”

  “I hope not.”

  Maggie was quiet for a minute. The flickering candlelight played over their faces and over the walls and ceiling where their shapes were cast.

  “The funny thing is,” Maggie said. “I really haven’t given New York a second thought since I got up here last night, but I guess the phone is a tenacious link.”

  “You can run, but you can’t hide,” Jane said.

  They were both feeling the effects of the wine by the time they finished cleaning up from dinner and went out onto the porch. Jane found that she was able to laugh at the memory of David’s expression when Francesca first approached him at the exhibit. And it seemed funny to both of them also that after an afternoon’s work, there was plenty to be done tomorrow, and that they were each silently looking forward to going to bed early like real farmers.

  It was another clear night. With all of the house lights turned off, the stars seemed especially bright and the sounds of the night especially close.

  “Shall we take a walk?” Maggie asked.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

  “Maybe.”

  They grabbed the Chianti and walked together back toward the pond. They didn’t need a candle. As they went along, Maggie pointed at the various constellations of the early fall sky, stopping occasionally to guide Jane’s eyes along her outstretched arm to a particularly difficult one to find amidst the thousands of stars and the thick band of the Milky Way. Soon they were at the edge of the pond.

  “Is it too cold?” Maggie asked. She had slipped off one of her sneakers and put a toe in the water.

  “It’s cold,” Jane said. “But not too cold.”

  “I’ll race you to the raft!”

  Maggie quickly pulled down her coveralls and stripped off her t-shirt. She wasn’t wearing anything underneath.

  “Cheater!” Jane yelled, struggling to get out of her clothes. “You had a head start!”

  Maggie let out a yell of triumph and dove in first, but Jane was by far the better swimmer, and before Maggie could get up the ladder on the side of the platform, Jane had caught her and grabbed her around the waist. Maggie held on tight to the railing until Jane slid her hands up Maggie’s ribs and with a screech of laughter Maggie released her grip and fell back into the water.

  By the time she resurfaced, Jane was almost on the platform. Maggie hoisted herself over the side without benefit of the ladder and they stood facing each other, crouching like two wrestlers.

  “There’s only one King of this mountain,” Maggie said.

  “And that would be me,” Jane replied.

  She rushed at Maggie who side stepped her but Jane stuck out her arm and wrapped it around Maggie’s waist, locking her hands together from behind as Maggie slipped to her knees. Maggie tugged at Jane’s hands, and was successful in freeing one of them, but the other remained to tickle Maggie again high on the ribs where she was especially sensitive. Inadvertently, her hands traveled over Maggie’s breasts.

  “Sorry about that,” Jane said.

  They were both breathing hard from the exertion. Jane’s chin was resting on Maggie’s upper back and she held her tight with both arms wrapped around her middle. Maggie’s skin felt pleasantly warm against Jane’s chest.

  “Don’t be sorry,” Maggie said. “You won.”

  Gently, she took Jane’s hands and guided them ever so tenderly, patiently upward and onto her breasts. She let out a small sigh of pleasure when Jane’s fingers moved lightly over the nipple and caressed her soft flesh.

  Jane kissed Maggie on her neck and cheek, and Maggie turned, her lips seeking Jane’s, her hands traveling slowly along the side of Jane’s body and across her thighs.

  Jane shivered.

  “Shall we go back inside?” Maggie asked. “Are you cold?”

  “Race you to my bed?” Jane answered.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  In Detective Smalley’s living room facing a 42-inch TV, there was a small Victorian loveseat that Emily had bought at an auction upstate a year after they were married. She had refinished the wood in their cellar herself and put on a new maroon fabric and carefully reused the original tacks that held the cloth in place. In front of the sofa was a square mahogany coffee table that she had picked up for a few dollars at a local yard sale—a beautiful, well-made piece that she was very proud of finding, although she would never say so. On opposite sides of the coffee table were two matching easy chairs with a flowered pattern on the fabric that everyone admired. Everyone. The earthy red background matched the color of the loveseat perfectly. She had spotted the chairs in a Goodwill Store, scrounged the garment district for fabric that would have cost over a hundred a yard, but she got for twenty-five, and then made a deal with the upholsterer.

  Smalley sat on the loveseat. Rolando Jimenez sat in one of the chairs, obviously on edge, a bundle of nerves, as Emily would have described it, if Smalley hadn’t asked her to linger at church after the service on this beautiful Sunday morning. Smalley had invited Rolando to come over for a little chat, and Rolando had agreed without a word, without a question, without a whimper—given up his Sunday, one of his two days off this week, just to see Detective Smalley.

  “Nice of you to come, Officer Jimenez,” Detective Smalley had said when he had opened the front door. Rolando had stood with his hands clasped in front of him, a curiously obsequious pose, as though he were going to church. He was dressed in a new pair of light beige khaki pants, equally crisp shirt, also beige, an amber colored windbreaker, polished brown leather shoes and patterned socks that matched the rest of his outfit. Nice. Sharp. His mouth seemed a little dry. His tongue flicked over dry lips. His eyes were everywhere except in contact with the Detective’s. Smalley noted that too.

  “Can I get you something to drink?” Smalley had asked him. “Coffee? Water? Beer? I know it’s before noon—”

  “A beer would be good,” Rolando had said quickly, passing his tongue over his lips again and coming into the detective’s home. He had taken off his jacket and folded it neatly over his arm and was waiting for the detective when he returned from the kitchen with the beer. Again, he held his hands clasped before him in that curious way. His shirt had short sleeves and his arms were bare, with very little fat, just muscle and tendon and veins that moved under the skin in a way that seemed vaguely obscene.

  “Here’s your beer,” Smalley had said. “Have a seat. Make yourself comfortable.”

  Now, Detective Smalley pointed the remote control at the DVD player on a shelf below the TV. Minutes earlier, without explanation to his fidgety guest, Smalley had inserted the unmarked DVD that he had found on his doorstep earlier that morning when he went out to get the paper. He didn’t have to ask if Rolando had received his own copy from the same anonymous messenger. Rolando had already answered that question by the way he had downed the beer in a couple of big
gulps, the way he had rolled the can back and forth in his hands and lifted it to get the last drop three or four times now, the way his lips still appeared dry beyond recovery as he waited for the show to begin.

  The subject of the video file on the DVD was Jose Torres. The camera was focused on him from the middle of the chest up. He was not wearing a shirt and the hairs on the top of his chest were visible in the picture, matted with sweat between his pectorals. He had not shaved for at least a day, and the darkness around his cheeks and jaw line gave him the look of a fugitive. A woman who was not in the view of the camera was asking him questions and he was answering. The first series of questions identified him for the viewer—name, address, occupation, badge number. Then it identified Mariana Morales, his girlfriend, and the mother of his child, who had obtained a protective order from the Family Court for New York County. Next it established where she lived.

  It was very precisely done. The inquisitor was either a lawyer or someone who spent a great deal of time in a courtroom. After each question, Jose’s gaze drifted down as though there were something just out of the view of the camera that made him afraid. Each time he did so, the woman’s voice commanded him to look at the camera.

  Seated to Smalley’s right, Rolando watched intently. He had crossed his legs, his right ankle resting on his left knee. His foot jiggled endlessly. The empty beer can was balanced in his lap.

  WOMAN: You went to Mariana’s apartment even though you knew there was a protective order, is that right Officer Torres?