Chapter 22
Dear Natasha,
Why are these boards of food all the rage? What happened to cooking and baking?
Blue Ribbon Country Cook in Board Camp, Arkansas
Dear Blue Ribbon Country Cook,
The boards are easy to make and are very attractive to the eye.
Natasha
Nina gasped. “He didn’t!”
Francie shook her head and said, “You are not going alone, then.”
“It wasn’t an I’ll get you kind of thing. He said I would end up like Orson. But when he said it, I felt as though it was something he threw out there to scare me. Like an old man trying to frighten kids so they wouldn’t play in his yard.”
Nina cocked her head. “You think he’s hiding something?”
“I don’t know. He’s an unusual guy. He can flip back and forth from a saccharine sycophant to an ogre.”
“Really?” Francie smiled. “That’s good to know. I’ll tag along.”
We agreed to meet at Francie’s house in an hour. I cleaned up our breakfast packaging and headed inside for a shower. I dressed in a sleeveless white dress with a cherry-red floral print. Simple and cool, but ladylike and appropriate for almost any daytime event.
Francie had donned a wide-brimmed hat with a loose linen pant outfit. Nina opted for a cool turquoise linen dress.
The heat was still bearable as we walked toward Karl’s Fine Antiques. The exterior of the store would not have lured me inside unless I was in the market for a rusted frying pan. It had large show windows, but otherwise gave a rundown impression. It needed a good cleaning. I paused to look at the windows. They weren’t even being put to good use. Instead of featuring lovely pieces that might encourage people to enter the store, they were piled with a hodgepodge of junk. Buckets, footstools, and chairs that were probably from the 1990s crowded together.
We stepped inside and I realized immediately why Karl and Orson split up. Paintings and mirrors leaned against furniture. Nothing hung on the walls except for a few spiderwebs. There were discolored rectangular blotches where it appeared paintings or mirrors might have once hung. Unlike Orson’s store, which, crowded as it was, had a method to the madness, Karl’s place looked like an indoor junkyard. Rusted lawn furniture mingled with coils of copper and a small collection of old tires.
“Not quite as elegant as Orson’s shop,” whispered Nina.
That was an understatement.
Francie had taken an interest in a side table that had seen better days. She ran her hand over it. “I think I threw this out last year.”
“Ladies!” Karl’s voice boomed through the room. He hustled toward us, again looking quite dapper in a pale blue seersucker suit and a matching blue bow tie dotted with strawberries. “Welcome, welcome! What can I help you with today?” His gaze lingered on Francie as if he was sizing her up. “That’s a very fine side table. You have excellent taste.”
Francie’s mouth twitched into a smile. “How much are you asking for it?”
“For you? I’ll give you twenty-five percent off the asking price of two hundred dollars. It’s a steal.”
“I’ll say,” Francie said snarkily.
But then he turned in my direction. “You!” He sounded appalled and maybe a little bit worried. “Are you together?”
Nina quickly responded, “No.”
I could see a wave of relief sweep over his face. In the sweetest tone imaginable, he said to me, “I’ll be with you as soon as I can.” He turned his attention to Francie. “This is genuine mahogany straight from Paris. You certainly know fine furniture!”
Straight from Paris? I doubted that.
I kept an eye on Karl and drifted toward the rear. I could hear Francie asking him to pick up the side table so she could see underneath it.
The door through which he had come hadn’t closed completely. Hoping it wouldn’t screech, I used the tip of my sandal to push it farther open.
To my surprise, it led to a kitchen. An old-fashioned one that had been pieced together. A skirt hung under a deep farmhouse sink. A tarnished copper kettle with a delft handle sat atop an aqua range that had to be from the 1960s. A newspaper and a remote control lay on a coffee table next to a Chinese food takeout container, and a plate of lo mein. Behind a plush brown sofa, a narrow stairway led to the second floor. A collection of framed photographs on the stairway wall were like a timeline of his life. I was fairly certain he was the adorable little boy jumping off a pier and riding a horse bareback. With a start, I realized that I was peering into his home. I’d bet anything that there were bedrooms upstairs.
I longed to peek at the second floor, but that would be wrong. I backed out of the doorway and moseyed toward the checkout desk. Pretending to be interested in a tall wire birdcage, I eyed the desk. There wasn’t a cash register, a credit card machine, or a drawer with a lock. Of course, he could be using a tiny credit card swiper. But it was still curious. Didn’t he take cash? When he made a sale, did he duck behind a magic curtain somewhere?
As I made my way back toward Francie and Nina, I spied a frosted glass Christmas tree topper for two dollars. It appeared brand new, as if never used, and was nestled on green velvet in what looked to be the original box. I had never seen one like it. It had been hand painted with a tasteful floral design. I picked it up and carried it over to Karl.
“I’ll have to think about buying the table,” said Francie firmly. If I hadn’t known she didn’t intend to buy it at all, I might have believed that she was wavering.
“I only have the one. These Parisian items go fast!” Karl warned.
I held out the Christmas tree topper. “Look what I found!” I pretended to be thrilled and pulled a twenty-dollar bill from my wallet so he would have to make change.
The edge of Karl’s mouth pulled to the side as if he was aggravated.
He took his wallet out, handed me eighteen dollars, and pocketed my twenty. No bill of sale. No record of the sale. And the money certainly didn’t go into any sort of cash register.
I closed the box carefully. “Thank you.” I couldn’t be sure, of course, but I thought he was miffed that I interrupted his chat with Francie over the higher priced table.
He peered at me. “Is that why you came here? For an off-season ornament?”
“Of course. Did you expect something else?” I asked ever so innocently.
“Mmmfft. Excuse me.” He turned toward Nina and Francie. “I hope you’ll come back for the table. I don’t hold anything, you understand. The next lady might snap this up.”
Francie acted flustered and waved her hands around like a novice actor. “I can’t make up my mind.”
Nina checked her watch. “We have to go, or we’ll miss that appointment.”
I slipped out the door ahead of them and heard them thanking him as the door closed.
I hurried along the street, out of sight of the shop. Nina and Francie caught up to me.
“Honestly!” Francie exclaimed. “That is the very table I put out for the trash collector. I know it is because there’s a ding on the corner where Duke knocked it over. He must be collecting things that people are getting rid of.”
“Imagine his nerve trying to pass it off as Parisian. Although,” Nina said, “we’ve become such a disposable society that we throw out a lot of perfectly good things. So maybe there’s some good in collecting serviceable items and saving them from landfills.”
She had a point. “I’ve seen the horrible side of him, but in spite of that, I feel sorry for him now. I think he lives in the back of the store and upstairs.”
“In my day, a lot of people did that when they owned stores. There’s nothing wrong with that.” Francie directed us toward Audrey’s house.
“With prices the way they are in Old Town, I’m surprised he doesn’t rent out the upstairs. It might look downtrodden, but I bet he could charge a lot of rent. Is this the house?” asked Nina.
Cream-colored, with seashore-blue shutters, the house was small but exceedingly well kept. Gauzy white curtains prevented people on the sidewalk from looking inside. A flower box hung underneath the window, overflowing with cascading petunias in shades of rose and lavender.
The front door, which matched the blue shutters, opened and Audrey stepped outside. “Hi! Come in out of the heat. I’ve prepared watermelon spritzers.”
We filed inside. Audrey clearly loved blue. The cream-and-blue theme continued with loads of chinoiserie accents. A small dining nook was set up with a gorgeous Hepplewhite sideboard. I pegged it as an antique or a remarkable reproduction.
A little voice called out, “Come in. Come in.” A vibrant blue parakeet squawked from his perch in a white cage.
“You shouldn’t have gone to any trouble for us,” I said.
“And why not? I love entertaining guests. People got away from that for a while, but I think we’re moving back in that direction now.”
“Show them your garden!” said Francie.
Audrey led us past the dining nook into a combination kitchen and family room. She had abandoned the formal white-and-blue motif in favor of flowers. It was reminiscent of an English country cottage with vibrant floral patterns on the sofa, chairs, and pillows. Beyond the family room, real flowers bloomed in a riot of colors. Except for a table and two chairs, Audrey had filled every inch of her garden with tomato plants, cucumbers, herbs, foxglove, geraniums, roses, hosta, and daisies. There were so many plants, and they were all mixed together.
“This is beautiful,” I said. “Is that a set of cast aluminum garden tools?” The pretty stand meant to hold them only contained two. She must have left the trowel where she was last using it. I did that all the time and then had to search for it.
“It is. I’m never going back to wood handles. Even when I leave them outside, they look like new. They were a gift from Orson.”
“How do you have time for this? You must garden all day long. I don’t see a single weed,” said Nina.
“It’s only a weed in the eye of the beholder. I love a lot of invasive plants like thistle and . . . see that yellow one over there? The tall stalk? That’s a yellow mullein. In the old days, people made tea out of them for colds and coughs because they’re an expectorant. Today, though, they’re considered a noxious weed because they spread their seeds like crazy. But I think they’re lovely.”
Nina and I agreed with her, but Francie laughed. “You’re the only person I know who intentionally plants those things. I’m not coming over here to help you pull them all out of the garden next year!”
Audrey laughed along with her and led us back to her living room. She gestured toward a cream-colored sofa.
A tray of frosty glasses and a pitcher of watermelon-red liquid were on the coffee table next to a platter of pastries.
Francie asked, “What is the bird’s name?”
“You have to see this.” Audrey opened the cage door and the bird readily stepped onto her finger. “What’s your name?”
“Bond. James Bond,” said the bird.
We all cracked up.
“His previous owner taught him that. Isn’t it adorable?”
“Are you a pretty boy?”
“Dishy hunk!” James Bond said as if he understood.
She fed him a morsel and brought him over to show us. “Hello! Hello!” he called.
We chorused, “Hello.”
“He’s so entertaining. My nephew lived with me for a while when he moved to Old Town. He has his own place now and I hated the silence in the house. You know how that is? Kind of like being an empty nester, I guess. But with James Bond in the house, I can’t help being happy. He was just the ticket for, well, everything that ails me.”
“You mean Orson’s demise, I suppose?” Francie picked up her watermelon spritzer and pressed the cool glass against her face.
“Orson!” James Bond looked around and up at the ceiling.
Audrey took a deep breath. “It came as such a shock to me. I feel his loss so deeply.”
“The death of a close friend is hard to deal with.” Nina eyed the pastries and selected a mini cream puff.
“I can’t believe he’s gone. I catch myself picking up the phone to call and tell him something, and then there’s the sudden blow again when I realize that he’s not here anymore. I think the hardest part for me is that he never told me about Wanda. And now, I’ll never know what happened there.”
“Orson never told you?” I asked. “How could that be?”
“How could he? Howww could he?” sang James Bond.
“You went out with him for a long time, didn’t you?” asked Francie.
“For years! If anyone was going to marry Orson, I thought it would be me. Imagine my shock at learning that he was engaged to another woman. For the life of me, I still cannot understand why he wouldn’t have had the decency to tell me. And really, Wanda? Of all the women in the world, I never would have thought he would choose her. She’s not his type at all. She’s, she’s, well, I can’t find a nice word for what she is. I hope she’s not a close friend of yours, but the woman is what we used to call a country cousin. You know, unsophisticated and dowdy. I can’t imagine what he saw in her.”
I resisted the urge to defend Wanda because I wanted Audrey to keep talking.
“And that worries me.” Audrey shook her forefinger in the air. “I have to wonder if that’s why he never mentioned her. Was he ashamed? Embarrassed?”
“He probably didn’t want you to know he was two-timing you,” said Nina.
“I certainly thought that in the beginning, but the more I consider everything that happened, I have to wonder if there was something else.”
Francie appeared doubtful. “Like what?”
“You see, that’s what I don’t know. I wonder if she had some hold over him. Maybe she forced him to change his will in her favor.”
“You mean like a spell or something?” It was far-fetched, but Wanda did believe in potions and the like. I couldn’t help thinking of the daffodil-based products she sold.
Audrey flapped her hand in the air. “I don’t give any credence to that kind of thing. I hear Wanda does, but Orson wasn’t the type to fall for incantations or curses. He would have laughed at that as nonsense. Do you see what I’m saying? He didn’t buy into that backcountry mysticism. Orson was a curious man and by that I don’t mean peculiar. He was well read and interested in many things. People associate him with antiques, and he knew more than anyone I’ve ever met in that arena. But he was also into genealogy and human behavior. Oh! And woe be the person who got him started on Jordan, his son-in-law.”
Francie smiled. “No love lost there, eh?”
“I should say not. Orson treated Stella like a princess. That girl could do no wrong in her father’s eyes. But he ranted about Jordan. Did you know that Orson anteed up the funds for Jordan to open a restaurant not once but twice? He wanted so much for Stella to be happy and financially stable.” Audrey shook her head. “It never happened for her. But not for lack of trying on Orson’s part.”
For a moment, she sat quietly and nibbled on a miniature chocolate eclair. “No. Something happened for sure. I wonder if I’ll ever know what. I don’t trust Wanda. And then he went and left his store to some other woman. Why in the world he didn’t leave it to Stella is a mystery. Who knows what kind of influence that woman and Wanda had over him!”