High Kicks, Hot Chocolate, and Homicides

by Mary McHugh

  ½ cup red bell pepper, chopped

  ½ cup chopped shallots

  3 T. chopped fresh basil or 1 tsp. dried basil

  2 T. fresh lemon juice

  2 T. mayonnaise

  1 T. Dijon mustard

  ½ tsp. Tabasco sauce

  dash Worcestershire sauce

  3¼ cups fresh bread crumbs

  1 large egg

  2 T. salted butter

  2 T. vegetable oil

  tomato salsa

  1. Mix first nine ingredients in a large bowl. Add salt and pepper.

  2. Add ¼ cup of the breadcrumbs and the egg. Mix thoroughly into the other ingredients.

  3. Shape the mixture into eight patties.

  4. Coat patties with the rest of the breadcrumbs.

  5. Cook the patties in the butter and vegetable oil until they’re golden brown on each side.

  6. Serve with tomato salsa.

  Mary Louise’s cooking tip: Luckily none of the things Alice ate in Wonderland made her fatter—just taller. Nothing wrong with that.

  Chapter 4

  I’m Late, I’m Late For A Very Important Date

  I was ready to start dancing, but Detective Carver was back on stage, waiting for the rest of the Rockettes to join us. When everyone had assembled, he spoke to us.

  “I’m afraid I must delay your rehearsal for a little while. I apologize, but we have some new information about Glenna Parson’s death. I would like to speak to Marlowe Stanley, Nevaeh Anderson, Danielle Jennings, Andrea Shapiro and Shelli Anderson in one of the dressing rooms, please. The rest of you may either wait here or leave.”

  Our three teachers and Shelli and Marlowe followed the detective offstage.

  “Now what?” Janice asked.

  “I guess we just wait until he finishes with them,” Tina said.

  Just then, one of the Rockettes ran onto the stage.

  “Are you Tina?” she asked

  “I am,” Tina answered.

  “Well, Marlowe asked me to give you a message,” she said. “She told me to tell you that you can leave now because it doesn’t look like there will be time for any more rehearsals today.”

  “Thanks,” Tina said, then turned to us. “That’s it, gang. We might as well have another New York day and come back tomorrow. Do whatever you want and meet me here at five. Either Peter will take us home or I’ll hire a car. I’m going back to the Frick to make more reception plans if anyone wants to come along.”

  That sounded good to me. I hadn’t been to the Frick for a while. It was my favorite museum in New York. “I’m coming with you, Tina.”

  The others got out their phones to contact their friends, and Tina and I left to get a cab.

  * * *

  The minute we stepped in the door of that venerable museum on Seventy-First Street and Fifth Avenue, I felt as if I were in the home of an old, very rich friend. Tina took my hand and led me into the garden court in the center of the main floor.

  “We can’t actually have the wedding in the museum—they don’t allow that. But we can have the reception here. It will be in this garden,” she said, her voice hushed.

  I could not think of a lovelier place to have a reception. An oval pool surrounded by roses and oleanders graced the center of the court, with little cupids tucked under the flowers and a large fountain in the middle the focal point of the garden. A nude statue watched over one side of the room, a winged angel the other. Pairs of majestic Ionic columns framed the room on three sides. The arched skylight above brightened the room. We were the only people in the garden court on this day. Its serenity embraced me.

  “Oh, Tina, this is exquisite,” I said, sitting down on one of the white marble benches beside the pool.

  “Isn’t it?” she said, joining me. “I needed to find the perfect place because I’ve been putting this wedding off for such a long time. I love Peter, but I couldn’t shake off the feeling that I was somehow being disloyal to Bill to get married again. We had such a good marriage, Weezie.”

  “I remember,” I said. Bill was a wonderful husband and he adored Tina.

  “Peter has been an angel,” Tina said. “He doesn’t push me, but I know how much he wants to get married. A couple of months ago—right after we got back from Rio—he brought me here. He didn’t say anything, but when I saw this garden and the rooms with the paintings, rooms with furniture in them just the way they were when the Fricks lived in them, I knew I wanted to have my reception in this garden. I kissed Peter on this bench and told him I would plan the wedding right away if we could have the reception in the museum. I’m sure that’s why he brought me here. He just hugged me and said, ‘Of course, darling.’ ”

  “It’s perfect,” I said. We inhaled the peace and silence of this lovely garden for a few minutes, and then Tina stood up and said, “Come see the Living Hall. It’s my favorite.”

  I followed her into the Living Hall, which was a large oak-paneled room, upon which some of the most impressive paintings in the world hung. Bellini’s enormous St. Francis in the Desert dominated the room. On one side of it, Titian’s thoughtful, dreamy Portrait of a Man in the Red Cap contrasted with his Pietro Aretino, which portrays a powerful man aware of his own exalted place in the society of his time. Holbein’s Sir Thomas More glared across the room at More’s mortal enemy Thomas Cromwell, also painted by Holbein. Paintings by Reynolds and Gainsborough lined the walls on both sides of the room.

  “There are three Vermeers in this museum,” Tina said. “There’s only about thirty-six paintings by him in the whole world. Janice will be thrilled that we’re having the reception here. She loves Vermeer more than anyone I know. I understand how she feels. He’s one of my favorites too.”

  She pulled me over to Vermeer’s Mistress and Her Maid.

  “I love this painting,” she said. “I made up a whole story to go with it. The maid is handing her mistress a note from her lover. She’s married to a rich Dutch merchant, but she’s bored and is having an affair with her music teacher. The light from the window shines down on her velvet gown with the ermine trim. There are pearls woven into her hair in back. And because of Tracy Chevalier’s book, Girl with a Pearl Earring, I believe the maid is the model for that painting.”

  “Me too,” a voice in back of us said. We turned around and saw Rockette Andrea Shapiro standing there.

  “Hi, you two,” she said. “The police questioned me first, so I ran over here to help you plan your reception. I work at this museum the rest of the year when I’m not dancing at the Music Hall.”

  “Fantastic,” Tina said. “What do you do here?”

  “I arrange events in the museum, especially wedding receptions. I love doing this. Glenna didn’t want me to have two jobs. She wanted me to work with her at Radio City planning events for the Rockettes in other cities. I didn’t want to do that, and I told her so, but she kept dredging up stuff for me to do so I couldn’t come here. Now I’m free to spend all the time I want at the Frick. Marlowe is fine with it.”

  She saw the look Tina and I exchanged and added hastily, “Not that I’m glad Glenna is dead, of course. I just meant, it’s easier now. Come on in my office, and we can plan the food and the music and everything else we need to make this the best reception ever.”

  Tina started to follow her and then remembered I was there. “Oh, Weezie,” she said, “Do you want to join us?”

  “No, no,” I said. “I’ll just wander around the museum for a while and then roam around the park before I head back to the theater. I might take the train back home. If I decide to do that, I’ll call you and tell you not to wait for me.”

  “Sounds good,” Tina said, following Andrea into another part of the museum.

  I strolled around the rooms and corridors of this wonderful old house, enjoying the lightness and change of mood in the Fragonard Room, where the walls are graced with a series of his paintings called The Progress of Love. I lingered in the West Gallery to look at landscapes by Constable and C
orot and portraits by Rembrandt and Velasquez.

  But it was in the South Hall, tucked away in the alcove under the stairs, that I found a painting by my favorite artist, Renoir. It’s called La Promenade, and it’s full of sunshine and color, as all of his paintings are. It’s why I love the Impressionists. They always make me feel good, light-hearted. I lingered in front of this scene of a young mother, dressed in dark blue, wearing a lacy, flowery hat, walking along a path with her two little girls, identically clad in turquoise dresses and jackets, trimmed with white fur. One of her daughters is carrying a white fur muff, the other a doll, dressed as elaborately as she is. Both children wear white hats, white tights, and white shoes. There is white lace around the hems of their dresses. The path is lined with flowers and shrubs, and other mothers and fathers and children can be seen in the background.

  I think one of the reasons I love Renoir’s paintings so much is there was a print of one of his paintings, Portrait of Madame Georges Charpentier and her Children, hanging over the fireplace in the living room of my writing professor in college. The seminar she held for six of us who wanted to be writers was held in this room instead of a classroom.

  Every week we would submit our stories to her and discuss them, watched over by Madame Charpentier. I can still close my eyes and see that painting. A young mother in a black dress looking lovingly at her two little children in blue dresses trimmed with lace. Both have curly blond hair. One child is sitting on a colorful couch, the other is perched on the back of a sleeping Saint Bernard. There are flowers on a table nearby. A tapestry screen forms a background to the whole lovely scene.

  Those seminars were my favorite of all my classes. I gave up writing after college because I needed to make a living, but I wouldn’t have missed those afternoons beside that fireplace, watched over by Madame Charpentier, for anything.

  When I had had enough of paintings and sculptures, Italian bronzes, Chinese porcelains, and Limoges enamels, I left the Frick and went outside to walk through Central Park. It was a perfect day for it. The weather was crisp and cool. I always feel calm and yet stimulated at the same time in this beautiful park designed by Frederick Olmsted and Calvert Vaux in 1858. They somehow made the park a combination of action and peace and quiet.

  There were lots of places where you could just sit and do nothing, watching other people passing by and making up stories about them. Or you could sit by the pond and watch children sailing boats. You could eat in The Boathouse on the lake, the way Mike and I did the day before. Or, if you had more energy, you could go for a run on the paths set aside for joggers. You could probably also get mugged if you were in the wrong place at the wrong time, but somehow I was never afraid in this park.

  As I walked along the path heading north, I saw one of my favorite things in the whole park. The statue of Alice in Wonderland by a little pond. Alice, hair ribbon neatly in place, was sitting on a large mushroom, accompanied by the White Rabbit on the left looking at his watch. I knew he was saying, “I’m late, I’m late, for a very important date,” since I read and reread Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll when I was a child. I even remembered that Lewis Carroll’s real name was Charles L. Dodgson.

  The Mad Hatter was on Alice’s right, looking wildly around for a way to escape. The Cheshire Cat sits on her lap and the March Hare is settled in next to her. I loved this statue. I used to bring James here when he was little. I would lift him up onto the huge mushroom to climb all over Alice and her tea party friends. He never wanted to leave. Neither did I for that matter.

  When James and I came here, there were usually lots of other children piling onto the statue too, clinging to Alice’s head and to the White Rabbit. I stood in front of the mushroom to catch James if he should slip and fall because it was a long way up for a three-year-old. But he was as sure-footed then as he now was sure of what he wanted to do with his life. He was in law school to become an attorney like his father. He and George were very close. It warmed me to see them together, talking, exchanging stories and memories, loving each other. George was a good father, even if he wasn’t all that great a husband lately.

  Today, though, I remembered James as a little boy, laughing and tumbling about on Alice’s lap with the other children, happy and safe and loved. Lucky child to know without any doubt that he was totally and unreservedly loved by his parents, no matter what mistakes he made or whatever happened to him in life.

  When my little boy was ready to leave Alice, we would sit on a bench by the pond and eat the sandwiches I brought with me. Peanut butter and jelly for both of us, with snickerdoodle cookies for dessert. My mother used to make those cookies for me and my sister when I was little, and I made them for my children. I cherish that recipe, smudged and faded.

  Those days were so precious. I treasured them at the time. I never took them for granted. I was glad we moved to the suburbs after we had our second son, Sam, but I missed my days with James and Alice and those peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches. I missed New York, too, so I was glad we would have this time in the city dancing at Radio City.

  There were no children around today, so I sat down on the mushroom next to Alice to bring back that feeling I had when I was there with James. I closed my eyes and reveled in the sweetness of those bygone days.

  “You look as if you’re in Wonderland with Alice,” a familiar voice said. “No, don’t get up. You belong there.”

  I opened my eyes. Mike was standing there.

  “How did you know I was here?” I asked.

  “You didn’t answer your phone, so I called Tina and she said you were probably in the park. I wanted to find out what the detective said. Are you okay?”

  He came over and lifted me down from the mushroom and my trip back to my young motherhood days. He kissed me. “You looked so beautiful up there. Come and live with me in my Wonderland. I’ll make you happy. I promise.”

  I leaned against him. How I wanted to go and live with him, this strong, kind, funny, loving man!

  “What did the detective tell you?” he asked me.

  “Nothing really. He just wanted to question some of the Rockettes, but he let us go.”

  “And you ended up here with Alice on her mushroom.”

  “Yes. I went to the Frick with Tina first. That’s one of my favorite places in New York, and she’s going to have her wedding reception there.”

  “Good idea,” he said, his hand smoothing my hair. I didn’t want to leave him, but I knew I had to.

  “It’s time for me to leave Wonderland, Mike,” I said. “Time for me to go home.”

  “All right, Alice,” he said. “Are you going back to the theater to ride home with Peter?”

  “No, it’s a little early for Peter,” I said. “I’ll take a train home from Penn Station. Can you hail a cab for me please?”

  “I have a better way to get you to Penn Station,” he said. “You can take a cab any time.”

  He raised his hand and waved to a man standing next to a horse and carriage nearby. The man climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled on the reins to get the horse moving toward us. The horse was white with red flowers around his harness. The cab was dark red with velvety white seats.

  “Oh Mike, I’ve always wanted to ride in one of these, but in all my trips to New York I’ve never done it. How lovely!”

  The driver was in his sixties. He wore a red top hat and a black leather jacket to match his carriage. He jumped down to help me into my seat. Mike got in beside me.

  “I thought you’d like this,” he said. “Jenny used to love it. Whenever we went to the theater, I would get one of these carriages to bring us back to our apartment after the play.”

  He touched my face. “And you’re so like her, Mary Louise.”

  The driver got back on his seat and made a “Giddyap”noise to his horse, who started slowly walking along a path going west in the park.

  The leaves on the trees in the park were just beginning to turn red and gold. Joggers ra
n past us, intent on their run. Central Park was at its finest that day. I relaxed and leaned back to enjoy this magical ride through flowers and greenery in the middle of a city built of steel and granite.

  Mike put his arm around me and pointed out things to me as we wound slowly west.

  “That’s one of my favorite fountains in the park,” he said, asking the driver to stop for a moment. “It’s Bethesda Fountain. It always seems so friendly.”

  And it was. There was an angel on top of the fountain, birds perched on its wings, little cherubs further down on the fountain, playing in the afternoon sunshine. The clear, cool water sprayed out all around the angel. A few people were seated on benches nearby, playing with their children, watching their babies, reading a magazine or a book, dozing in their chairs. It was a scene of such contentment; I wasn’t surprised that it was watched over by an angel.

  “He’s called the Angel of the Waters,” Mike said. “A woman named Emma Stebbins sculpted it in 1873.” He tapped the driver on the back to let him know we could proceed.

  The horse clopped along, not disturbed by the increasing number of cars and cabs passing us as rush hour got closer.

  Soon we came to my favorite part of the park, Strawberry Fields. I always loved the Beatles. I took guitar lessons when I was a teenager and my sister and I used to sing their songs enthusiastically. Badly, but enthusiastically. I still remembered that song, “Strawberry Fields Forever,” where nothing was real and nothing was too terrible to get hung about. It was a comforting thought for me when I was a teen and never sure everything would turn out all right.

  “Could you stop a minute, please, driver?” I asked.

  I wanted to look at the memorial for John Lennon, my favorite Beatle because he was so irreverent. I loved the large black-and-white mosaic in the pathway with the word Imagine inscribed on it. That song embodied everything I loved about Lennon and Yoko Ono. Their plea for peace and love in a world that seemed to forget that too often. I wanted to join those two dreamers in a peaceful place, where the world could live as one. I’m still waiting for that.