Charlie reached for a leaf of spinach to nibble. "Not too bad. Mavity got a lot done. She's a good worker, and a dear person." Mavity Flowers was an old school friend of Wilma's. She had gone to work cleaning houses when the small pension left by her husband began to dwindle under rising prices. She'd be in fair financial shape if she'd sell her Molena Point cottage and move to a less expensive area, but Mavity loved Molena Point. She would rather stay in the village and scrub for a living.
Charlie rose and got two beers from the refrigerator.
"Cold glasses in the freezer," Wilma said. "I guess Mavity can be a bit vague at times."
"Aren't we all?" Charlie fetched two iced glasses, opened the bottles, and poured the dark brew down the frosted sides with care. "Mavity works right along, she doesn't grouse, and she doesn't stop every five minutes for a smoke the way Stamps does. I don't think James Stamps will be with me long."
Charlie had hired Stamps from an ad she'd put in the paper. He hadn't been in Molena Point for more than a week or two. He told Charlie he'd moved to the coast because Salinas was too dry. He was renting a room somewhere up in the hills, near to the house Charlie was cleaning, the Hansen house; she was getting it ready for new owners.
"I got all the little repairs done. Replaced the cabinet door hinges in the kitchen, fixed the leak in the garage roof. Fixed the gate latches." She sighed and settled back, taking a long swallow of beer. "Mavity and I painted the bedroom, and Stamps picked up the shelving units for the closets."
"Sounds like more than a full day."
"I had to tell Stamps twice, no smoking in the house. He said, 'What difference? They won't be moving in for a week.' I told him that stink stays in a house forever. But how can he smell anything when he reeks of smoke himself."
"Did he do any work besides picking up the shelving?"
"Under my prodding. Got the front yard cleaned up, the lawn trimmed, and the new flowers planted. But my God, I have to tell him everything. Mix the manure and conditioner in before you plant, James. Treat the flowers tenderly, don't jam them in the ground.
"It's not that Stamps is dumb," Charlie continued. "He's bright enough, but he doesn't keep his mind on the job. Who knows where his thoughts are. The cleaning and repair business is definitely not James Stamps's line of work."
Charlie glanced idly at the paper. "One day I'll find the right people. Meantime I keep on baby-sitting him. I had to tell him twice to tie up his dog. It sleeps in his truck; I guess the people he rents from don't want it in his room. I don't blame them, the beast is a monster. I didn't want it tramping around in the clean house, getting dog hairs stuck in the fresh paint."
"I thought you loved dogs."
"I can hardly wait to get a dog. A big dog. But not a beast like Stamps's mutt. I want a nice, clean, well-mannered animal. That creature won't mind, and it's mean." She grinned. "At least Stamps didn't eat lunch with Mavity and me, that was a pleasure. It was real nice to be rid of him.
"But then he was twenty minutes late getting back, and when I made him work the extra twenty, he got mad." She finished her beer and got up. "I'm heading for the shower; I smell like a locker room."
Wilma hadn't mentioned the drawings. She wanted to wait for Clyde-and wait until Charlie had cleaned up and didn't feel so hot and irritable. Charlie could be testy-if she was in a bad mood, anything you said could be taken wrong. Patiently, sipping her beer, she sat reading the rest of the lead article and a second, longer story.
Ms. Aronson was unable to produce witnesses to her whereabouts the early morning of Ms. Jeannot's death. She claimed that she was alone in her Molena Point condominium. Neighbors testified that lights were on that morning in her living room and bedroom, but no witness saw her white Dodge van parked on the street. Ms. Aronson told the court she had parked on a side street, that there had been no empty parking places in front of her building.
She testified that she did not leave her apartment until nearly 7 A.M., when police phoned to notify her that Janet's studio had burned and that Janet had died in the fire. She said she dressed and drove directly to Ms. Jeannot's studio. Under questioning, Ms. Aronson admitted that she had a set of keys for Jeannot's studio and apartment. She claimed that Jeannot had given them to her so she could pick up and deliver work for exhibitions.
The second witness was Jeannot's sister, Beverly Jeannot, who also admitted to having a set of keys. Police said that on the day Janet was murdered they were not able to reach Ms. Jeannot at her home in Seattle until noon, though they made several attempts by phone to notify her of her sister's death. Ms. Jeannot claimed she had not been feeling well, and that she had unplugged her phone the night before. She said she slept until 11:45 the morning of the fire, that once she was notified she booked the next flight to San Francisco, with a commuter connection to Molena Point. She arrived in the village at three that afternoon.
Scheduled to testify later in the week is San Francisco art agent and former critic Kendrick Mahl, a name of national stature. Mahl is Janet Jeannot's ex-husband and is also the representing art agent for the accused. A partial transcript of today's court proceedings follows.
Wilma was scanning the transcript when Clyde knocked at the back door and pushed on in. He was well scrubbed, his dark hair neatly combed. He smelled faintly of Royal Lime, a nonsweet scent from Bermuda that Wilma liked, though she detested the heavy and too-sweet scents that most men applied. He was wearing a new shirt. The store creases spoiled only slightly the fresh look of the red madras plaid. He got a beer from the refrigerator and pulled out a chair, scowling at the headlines. "Don't they have anything else to write about?"
"Good color on you. Don't sit down. Go in the dining room."
"What? Are we eating formal?"
"Just go."
He gave her a puzzled look and swung away into the dining room, carrying his beer.
He was silent for a long time, she could hear the soft scuff of his loafers as he moved about the room, as if he were viewing the work from different angles and from a distance. When he returned to the kitchen he was grinning. "I thought, from the way you talked and from what Charlie said, that her work was really bad, that art school was a waste of time."
"It was a bust," Charlie said, coming in. She was dressed in a pale blue T-shirt with SAVE THE MALES stenciled across the front, and clean, faded jeans and sandals. She had blow-dried her sweaty hair and it blazed around her face as wild as the vanished sunset. "I should have gone to business school. Or maybe engineering, I've always been good at math. I'm sorry I didn't do that, maybe civil engineering. It was a big waste of time, that four years in art school. Big waste of my folks' money."
Clyde shook his head. "Those drawings are strong. They're damned good."
Charlie shrugged. "I enjoy doing animals, but it's nothing that will make me a living."
Clyde raised an eyebrow. "Don't put yourself down. Who told you that?"
"The fine arts department. My drawings-any animal drawings-are way too commercial, they have no real meaning. Just a waste of time."
"But you took commercial art, too," Clyde said. "You got a BS in both. So what did the commercial people say?"
Charlie gave him a twisted, humorless smile. "That there is no market for animal sketches, that this is not commercial art. That you have to use the computer, have to understand how to sell, have sales knowledge and a strong sense of layout. Have to be a real professional, understand the real world of advertising, bring yourself up into the electronic age. That this-drawing animals-is hobby work"
"Rubbish," Clyde said.
"Trouble is, I don't give a damn about commercial work." She got another beer from the refrigerator and picked up the silver flatware that Wilma had dropped in the center of the table. As she folded the paper napkins neatly in half, she gave Clyde a long look. "They know what they're talking about. I can draw for my own pleasure, but as for making a living, right now my best bet is CHARLIE'S FIX-IT, CLEAN-IT. And I like that just fine." She tossed back her hair and grinned. "I'm my own boss, no one telling me what to do." Reaching across the table, she arranged the silver at their three places and set the napkins around. At Clyde's angry look, she laughed. "My illustration instructor said I can draw kitties as a hobby."