“Buddhists don’t curse,” Paul corrected me. “They’re all about peace and harmony.”
“You’re right,” I conceded. “But I’m still thinking up curses. And it’ll take more than a drink to get you off the hook. If you think I’m going to cook for you tonight, you are out of your freaking mind. Buy me dinner.”
Paul attempted to kiss the tip of my nose, but I turned my head and he connected with my earlobe instead. “Hannah!”
“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ll get over it. Just give me time to stew.”
I waited for Paul to put on his coat, and as we walked in silence out Gate 3 and down Maryland Avenue toward the State House, he reached for and captured my hand. He squeezed it—one, two, three—our private code for “I love you”—and I felt my load lighten, my doubts begin to evaporate. By the time we reached Galway Bay, I was pretty sure about Paul. But Jennifer Goodall? Who knew what that scheming bitch might do?
CHAPTER 7
I’d forgotten until we got there that Tuesday is Pub Quiz Night at Galway Bay, the Irish pub and restaurant on Maryland Avenue that was our regular hangout. After hugs all around, Peggy, the hostess, showed us to a table for two near the front, and we’d just gotten settled with the menus when my sister Ruth breezed in, out of breath and unwinding a long bright purple scarf from around her neck. She’d knitted it herself, I knew, row after row, longer and longer, until the yarn she bought on sale had run out.
Paul and I picked up our coats and cheerfully moved to a nearby table for four. “I thought I’d find you here,” Ruth said, breathing hard. “Hutch will be along shortly.”
Hutch was short for Maurice Gaylord Hutchinson, attorney at law and my sister’s live-in boyfriend. The previous fall they’d bought a house together on Southgate, a gracious Victorian with a lawn that sloped gently down to the quiet waters of Spa Creek. Must be nice.
“You’re just in time, too,” Paul announced with a narrow-eyed look at me. “Hannah and I were running out of things to say to one another.”
Precisely the opposite was true. I had just attacked Paul for not having the sense that God gave a houseplant, chiding him repeatedly for not warning me about Jennifer Goodall, et nagging cetera, until he’d lost what was left of his savoir faire and suggested I put a lid on it.
“That’s true,” I agreed, with a withering glance at Paul over the top of my menu. “Your brother-in-law is a nincompoop. I have nothing further to say on the matter.”
I had decided to order an ice cold margarita. Maybe that would help quench the fires of rage still burning up my stomach lining. Or maybe I’d pour the drink directly over Paul’s head. Only time would tell.
The server took our orders, with Ruth asking for a Bass ale for the still absent Hutch. Ruth was bringing us up to date on the buying trip she was about to make to Hong Kong, when Fintan Galway, who managed the restaurant for his brother, appeared at our table. He was clutching a sheaf of papers, the first of two trivia quiz sheets, each bearing fifteen questions. “Eight P.M.,” Fintan announced, laying a quiz sheet on the table in front of us. “Your team’s playing tonight, right?”
Paul slipped his wallet out of his pocket and laid a ten dollar bill on the table. “The Puddle Ducks are ready!” he announced.
The previous week the Puddle Ducks came in second, losing out to the Sea Dogs by one question when the Sea Dogs knew that topless saleswomen were legal in Liverpool, England, but only in tropical fish stores. All the money went to charity: soup kitchens, needy local families, the SPCA. That week it was the Box of Rain Foundation that honored Lee Griffin, a local sailor, who had been brutally murdered during a senseless car jacking just a short block away from where we were sitting.
Paul, our resident brainiac, moved his beer to one side and spread the sheet out on the table in front of him. He started filling in the blanks, while Ruth and I chatted about some renovations she was planning for Mother Earth. Her shop was a perpetual work in progress.
Paul looked up. “What color is Mr. Spock’s blood?”
Ruth and I had been discussing carpet tiles versus wall-to-wall, so alien blood was a huge leap. We looked at each other. Ruth shrugged. “Ask me about native island cultures,” she suggested blandly. “I got an A-plus in cultural anthropology.”
It’d been ages since I’d seen an episode of Star Trek, but I couldn’t imagine alien blood being anything but green. Blue maybe; red in some galaxies. “Green?” I guessed.
“Is that your final answer?” Paul asked.
“Final answer.”
Our three heads huddled over the quiz sheet, and we had moved on to puzzling over what a turkey was in bowling alley slang when Hutch arrived, reeking of cigarette smoke and full of apologies. “Sorry, got caught outside my office by a client. Wanted to tell me all about this idea he has for investing in the company that’s going to start developing Parole.”
Parole was Annapolis’s first shopping center, long ago deserted by the department stores and specialty shops where my daughter and I used to shop for her school clothes. Sears had been the last holdout, moving to an anchor spot in nearby Annapolis Mall in the mid-nineties. Once Sears was gone, poor Parole had become a blot on the cityscape as deal after deal with its out-of-state owner had fallen through. In recent days, the bulldozers had been busy, pulverizing Sears, flattening Woodward and Lothrop, demolishing Hickory Farms and the Hallmark store, loading their remains in dump trucks and hauling them away. Old Parole was only a memory.
Hutch’s lips brushed Ruth’s cheek and he sat down. Ruth slid an ale in his direction. Hutch took a long sip, sighed, and smacked his lips. “So, where are we?” he asked, referring to the quiz.
“‘Who was the first U.S. presidential candidate to attempt the macarena in public?’” Paul read out loud.
Hutch knocked back another slug of ale before answering with some confidence, “Al Gore.”
Paul wrote “Al Gore” in the blank. “Okay,” he forged on. “How about this? What game begins with a corking?”
“Your fiftieth birthday party.” Ruth laughed.
I shrugged. “Don’t have a clue.”
Darts. The word buzzed around the restaurant like gossip about the latest scandal on Capitol Hill. Darts. Darts. Darts. Everyone, it seemed, had arrived at the question simultaneously.
“Darts,” I said with confidence.
Paul scribbled darts in the blank. “What soft drink, introduced in 1982, was the number three U.S. seller within two years?”
Ruth raised her hand for this one. “Diet Coke,” she said. “I remember it came on the market when Eric and I were on our honeymoon in Atlanta. But that’s another story.”
Eric was Ruth’s ex. And the story wasn’t pretty. They’d been married for nine years when Eric began easing the pain of advancing middle age by taking up with a succession of bimbos-du-jour. Until recently, he’d maintained a half interest in Mother Earth, but last summer, with Hutch’s help, Ruth had bought the jerk out.
Ruth’s knight in shining armor took her hand, tucked it under his arm, and leaned forward over the quiz sheet, reading aloud flawlessly, although the page was upside down. “What ‘founding mother’ was the first real woman to appear as a Pez dispenser head?”
We guessed Martha Washington on that one, but we were wrong. It was Betsy Ross.
After all the forms were collected and the scores tallied, we narrowly lost the game to the Axis of Evil team, playing from the cozy comfort of the bay window in the adjoining bar.
Looking a trifle crestfallen, Paul excused himself to go to the restroom, while Hutch wandered off in the direction of the bar, carrying his empty mug. I seized the moment to tell Ruth about Jennifer Goodall.
“Shit.”
“My sentiments exactly. And why the hell is she hanging around Mahan Hall? She doesn’t have anything to do with the musical.”
Ruth looked surprised. “You sure?”
“Positive. I’ve been working on it for over two weeks. If she were doing se
ts or costumes or makeup, I’d have noticed by now.”
Ruth frowned. “That girl you said she was talking to, Emma? Perhaps she’s in Goodall’s company.”
I shook my head. “No, she’s not.” I turned my glass by the stem until a fresh layer of salt was facing me. I raised the glass to my lips.
“I think I know,” said Paul.
I nearly dropped my glass. Until he spoke, I didn’t realize he’d been standing right behind me.
“I just ran into Jim Harle in the men’s room.” He smiled down at me. “You remember Jim. Computer services?”
I nodded.
“Well, Jim told me that Goodall’s the academy’s SAVI officer.”
“Savvy?” Ruth and I said it at the same time.
“S-A-V-I.” Paul spelled it out. “It stands for sexual assault victim intervention. One of her duties would be to provide the victims of sexual assault with an advocate.”
“Sexual assault …” I could barely go on. “You have got to be kidding!”
“Ironic, huh?”
Ruth stuck in her oar. “The I-word I’m thinking of is ‘insane.’”
“Knowing her,” I grumbled, “I bet she probably requested the assignment.”
Paul settled back into his chair, but whatever he’d been intending to say was interrupted by the arrival of our order—fish and chips for Ruth and me, Irish stew for Paul, and, I couldn’t help laughing, shepherd’s pie (without any actual shepherd) for Hutch, whenever he returned from the bar, that is.
As I munched my way through the succulent fish, I thought about the concerns Emma had shared with me about Kevin. I’d seen her talking in an animated way to Jennifer Goodall; then I’d seen Jennifer talking to Kevin. If Goodall was the SAVI officer, was it possible that Emma had been reporting Kevin as a harasser? Kevin was showering Emma with attention, it was true, mooning over her, but that didn’t necessarily count as harassment. But then, who knew what went on between them when they got back to Bancroft Hall?
All the same, I thought I might mention it to Dorothy. If Kevin had his sights set on flying FA18s for the Marines, a charge of sexual harassment would quash any dream he had of becoming a flying cowboy pretty damn quick. In this PC environment, he’d leave the Academy with a rocket tied to his tail.
Dorothy had lost faith in her husband. If Kevin were kicked out of the Academy, it would be more than a disappointment. She would probably survive the cancer, she might even survive a divorce, but that kind of news about Kevin could very well kill her.
CHAPTER 8
At Tuesday’s rehearsal Dorothy pooh-poohed my concerns about Kevin, but thanked me for them anyway.
We sat together in the center of the theater with Professor Medwin Black in the row just in front. On stage, the woman playing Joanna finished singing a sweet version of “Green Finch and Linnet Bird” that nearly broke my heart.
“My God,” Dorothy whispered. “That girl should be on Broadway.”
A few seats over, the unpleasant Greta James was muttering under her breath. If she was trying to impress the good professor, it wasn’t working. He uncrossed his legs, stood up, leaned across several rows, tapped her lightly on the shoulder and growled, “Enough!”
“Sorry.” Greta hunkered down; the hat she wore for her role in the chorus caught on the back of the chair and tipped over her eyes.
“The minute the cast is announced,” Professor Black complained to me, sotto voce, “the women all turn on each other. All the girls hate the female lead.” He waved a finger at the back of Greta’s head. “Sometimes I think we should be doing Cats.”
I laughed out loud.
It was nearly time for Greta’s entrance, so she gathered her costume about her and scurried away.
“That little missy,” Professor Black went on after Greta was out of earshot, “sent me a six-page letter outlining the flaws in our casting process and detailing how much better she’d be in the role of Joanna. She’s a good actress, but she couldn’t carry the role vocally. It’s always a balancing act.”
Dorothy shifted uncomfortably in her seat, then seemed to gather confidence. “How come Kevin didn’t get a lead?”
“Ah. Good question.” Professor Black leaned back in his chair, his hands folded prayerfully across his chest. “With Kevin, it was a tough call. He could easily have handled the role of Beadle—that’s why we’ve got him understudying it—but Adam Monroe did a terrific job, too, and he’s a firstie, so that had to carry some weight.” The professor smiled at Dorothy in the semidark of the auditorium. “Kevin will get his shot at the big-time next year.”
“Oh, yes? What show are you doing?” I asked.
Professor Black half belly-laughed, half snorted. “That’s what everyone wants to know, and we haven’t even gotten through this year’s musical yet!”
“Ballpark it for me,” said Dorothy.
“Well, if I were guessing, I’d say Gilbert and Sullivan. HMS Pinafore, to be exact. It’s one of the music director’s favorites and he’s been after me for years to do it.”
I turned to ask what Dorothy thought about the music director’s choice of HMS Pinafore and caught her staring at the stage, her face alight with pride, as Kevin as asylum keeper, Jonas Fogg, began his big scene with Anthony, the romantic lead. Anthony was aiming a pistol at her son, but he wavered, lost his nerve, dropped the gun. Joanna caught it and shot Kevin point-blank dead, but a few minutes later Kevin had sufficiently revived to join us.
Dorothy pulled down the seat of the chair next to her, but Kevin decided to sit at the end of the row just in front of us.
“That was terrific, Kev,” Dorothy said.
Her son whipped off his wig and arranged it carefully over one knee. “Thanks. You didn’t think I played it too weird?”
“It was just right,” I cut in. “Loved the way you handled the scissors. Reminds me of the mad scientist in Back to the Future. What’s his name?”
“Christopher Lloyd?”
“Yes, that’s the guy.”
“Thanks, ma’am.”
Suddenly Kevin stiffened. In the semidark he turned to scowl at his mother. “What’s Dad doing here?”
Dorothy’s head spun around so fast that I thought she’d get whiplash. Weaving his way through the auditorium toward us was a tall man dressed in civilian clothes. Ted Hart was an older version of his son—grayish hair still slightly red, wearing chinos and a leather bomber jacket which he unzipped as he eased between the seats.
“Am I too late?” he inquired, taking a seat right next to me.
“Just finished, Dad.”
“Damn! I’m sorry.” He favored me with a grin. “And this must be Hannah. Am I right?”
I extended my hand. “Right.”
“Dorothy says she doesn’t know what she’d do without you.”
“She’d be just fine, Admiral. The midshipmen do most of the work anyway. I mean, what I don’t know about wing nuts and mitered corners could fill an encyclopedia. Paintbrushes I can handle.”
“It’s Ted, Hannah. Call me Ted.” Even in the darkened theater his smile dazzled.
Kevin rolled his eyes and looked away.
“Ted, then.” I stole a glance at his wife. “The work keeps us out of trouble and off the streets, in any case.”
“It’s fun seeing it all come together like this,” Dorothy said, changing the subject.
“Is it still snowing?” I asked the admiral, thinking about the wet fat flakes that had been coming down earlier and about my cold walk home.
“Yes. Like Merry bloody Christmas.”
The admiral’s jacket, I noticed, was completely dry. But he was an admiral. Maybe it didn’t dare snow on him.
When the mids broke for dinner, the Harts, Admiral and Mrs., left for home together, and I hustled onstage to finish up on Mrs. Lovett’s harmonium. I spread a newspaper out to protect the floor and quickly sprayed the decorative scrollwork a bright gold. When I prepared to attach it to the front of her harmonium, though
, I realized I’d left the box containing my hot glue gun wrapped up in my sweatshirt down in the Jabberwocky room.
By then the cast had reassembled on stage and the Pair-o-Docs was giving them notes, so I stepped between Mrs. Lovett’s oven and the end of the body chute and trotted down the stairs to find it.
On the landing, I paused. Someone was in the Jabberwocky room, sitting on the sofa reading Trident, the Academy’s good news newspaper. On the front page of that week’s issue were two color pictures taken at last week’s rehearsal. In one, Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett stood, arms locked, their razors and rolling pin held high, respectively. Emma was featured in another picture in all her ragged regalia, grinning toothsomely, with one of her incisors painted a disconcerting black.
“Oh, excuse me,” I apologized brightly. “Forgot my glue gun.”
The person reading the newspaper looked up. It was Jennifer Goodall.
I stared at her, my mouth ajar. She eyed me coolly, with disinterest, without the slightest spark of recognition in her eyes.
Although she had no reason to recognize me—our paths had never officially crossed—it made me furious that the woman responsible for very nearly wrecking my marriage didn’t even know who I was. It seemed like only yesterday that deceptively innocent face had smiled out at me from the pages of too many newspapers, from behind too many microphones on too many broadcasts of the six o’clock news. Now, five years later, the face was leaner, the wrinkles around the eyes more pronounced, but Jennifer was still a very attractive young woman.
She was wearing the Naval Academy version of civilian clothes—chinos and a navy blue polo shirt—and no name tag.
I couldn’t wait to get away from her. I retreated, facing down the flight of stairs that would take me to the dressing room. My hand rested lightly on the pipe that served as the handrail, and it felt icy and cold as my heart.
If not now, Hannah, when?
I wheeled around. “You’re Jennifer Goodall, aren’t you?”
“Who wants to know?” Her voice was flat, almost bored. I wondered where the “Yes ma’am” had gotten to, but figured she only trotted out the courtesy when she was in uniform.
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