As always, parking in Harvard Square was a nightmare. This time, it felt like one of those bad dreams where you cannot achieve some time-sensitive goal thanks to everything moving in slow motion. Liz circled the area for fifteen minutes before finding a parking spot alongside the quirky building that housed a used bookshop and the Harvard Lampoon. Sitting on its own island in the road, the brick edifice sported a small dome and some club flags, which flapped in the same stiff breeze whipping up from the Charles River, wreaking havoc with Liz’s hair.
Late and disheveled, Liz walked as fast as she could in her heels over the uneven brick sidewalks. Built of the same kind of bricks that were used in most of Harvard’s classic architecture, the sidewalks added charm to the area around Harvard Square, even if they caused a good number of falls and twisted ankles. As she neared the building owned by Harvard’s Hasty Pudding Club, Liz slowed her pace to catch her breath, but that effort was wasted since the well-named restaurant, Upstairs at the Pudding, was located at the top of two steep staircases. By the time she’d scaled them, Liz felt not just windswept but winded.
Given the circumstances, the music she heard performed on a piano there seemed ill-chosen in the extreme: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “It Might as Well Be Spring.” Across a room filled with candlelit tables, Liz saw Cormac Kinnaird gazing at her as she gave the hostess her raincoat and then crossed the room to him.
“I’m as jumpy as a puppet on a string,” he said, “but now that you’re here, it might as well be—” He looked up at a waiter who appeared at that moment. Then he said to Liz, “How was your day? Should we celebrate it with champagne or recover from it with something that will warm the cockles?”
“The latter, I think.”
The doctor ordered. “We’d each like a dram of Lagavulin, straight up, in a brandy snifter, please.”
Liz took a moment to visit the ladies’ room where, as she tamed her auburn mane, she noticed her wind-burned cheeks made her look like she was blushing deeply. When she returned to the table, Cormac told her, “That was unnecessary. You looked fine with a little wind in your hair.”
“And now?”
He took the opportunity to look her over slowly before delivering his verdict. “Just as fine.” He raised his glass, “Here’s looking at you.”
Wearing an expression composed of congratulations—and some dismay—over the realization that he’d delivered the overused line with the panache of a practiced lady-killer, Liz raised her snifter in the air between them and took a sip. Meanwhile, the pianist launched into a jazzy rendition of “I’ve Got the World on a String.”
“That says it all for me today,” Cormac said waving his drink slightly in the direction of the pianist. “Some success at work and now a lovely dining companion.”
As she perused the sophisticated menu, Liz remarked, “It all looks so delicious that you could almost close your eyes and point blindly to any dish on it, assured you’d have a wonderful meal.”
“Then, shall I order for you?” Without waiting for a reply, he told the waiter, “The lady will have an order of brook trout encrusted with hazelnuts accompanied by stir-fried watercress and the roasted root vegetable julienne.”
The waiter nodded and took down the order carefully.
“Or perhaps she’ll have an order of lamb and prune cassoulet with couscous and baby carrots,” the doctor said.
“I don’t understand,” the waiter said, looking at Liz.
“We’ll choose our wine after we decide who’s eating which meal,” Cormac explained.
“Yes, sir,” the waiter said doubtfully, winking at Liz.
“Now we have a delicious subject for debate until the dinner is delivered,” Cormac said.
As they discussed the merits of trout and lamb, it occurred to Liz that her dining companion had not called her by name since she had arrived at the restaurant. She might be any reasonably attractive “lady” keeping company with the doctor. And when he took her in with his cool blue eyes, she was quite aware he’d done the same with the redhead in Tir Na Nog. As she finished her Scotch, she decided he might rely on other men’s lines, but at least he did so in a manner that made them his own. Certainly, the music—now the pianist was playing Gershwin’s “Embraceable You”—and the attention were intensely pleasant. By the time their dinners were served, she’d decided on the heartier meal and red wine, while he seemed pleased to take the fish and a glass of Riesling.
Seeing her pleasure in the music, he asked her if she played an instrument or sang herself. She admitted she once dreamt of becoming a cabaret singer. Instead of running with that revelation, he said he’d once studied violin, with little success.
“To hear me play it, you would never have thought I had a musical bone in my body,” he admitted. “It’s only thanks to a lucky chance that I found my way to world of Irish music—a woman I knew urged me to attend some of the sessions at Tir Na Nog—and now it gives me so much pleasure.”
“Was that the singer we heard last week?”
“Yes, she’s the one.”
“It appeared you’d known her for a long time.”
“What gave you that impression? No, not really. Say, didn’t we decide earlier today that you would tell me about your day over dinner?”
As the two tucked into their meals, Cormac gave his attention to Liz’s account of the ups and many downs of her day. “I’m impressed at all the balls you seem to have in the air,” he said. “That is often the case for me, too, but at least I’m not sent out on fool’s errands like that New Year’s resolution goose chase.”
“You know, it’s not as foolish an errand as it first appears, Cormac,” Liz said. “Yes, I’d love to have been trusted to handle a more obviously important assignment, especially breaking news. And in the context of longing to devote all my attention to Ellen Johansson’s disappearance, it was intensely frustrating to have to interview those girls today. But I took away some real insights from what one girl told me, which I shared with our readers in my story. Even if those words do not change one moment of any other reader’s life, the fact that they are reported will have an impact on the girls I quoted, who may have some pride as a result and, perhaps, one day use the article to support a job or college application. In addition, it’s good for the Department of Youth Services to have such good press. It might be useful when funding time comes around, and, God knows, those girls need all the assets they can get. It’s also good for the Banner to be a force in the community.”
“I wouldn’t have thought of all that. What you say makes me reconsider my attitude towards lifestyle pieces.”
“There’s no doubt there’s much more bang in breaking news—and there’s no doubt I’d rather cover it—but I like to think soft news has its own kind of impact,” Liz said, pausing to savor the cassoulet. “This is wonderful,” she enthused. She told Cormac about the afghan made by the DYS crocheting group. “Often when I’m frustrated about covering the community news beat, I feel better about it at the end of the day when I cover up with that afghan. It reminds me that what I do is important to somebody. In fact, it was that beat that brought me in contact with Ellen and Veronica in the first place.” Liz filled in the details of the Santa and Newton City Hall hora assignments for Cormac, explaining how her report caused the wallpaper stripping and admitting she didn’t examine the walls when she had a chance because she was too busy comforting Olga.
“Is it a good idea for you to become so personally involved with your sources? Of course in my forensics work, I must guard against emotional involvement. It would ruin my judgment, I’m sure.”