"The only topic of conversation hotter than your red truck is the end of Charlie Ashcraft. Everyone has a suspect and no one cares. Amazing." He stretched his long legs, unfolding himself from the cockpit of the Porsche. "It seems like everyone knew Charlie but no one really knew him."
"You could say that about a lot of people."
"Yes, I guess you could," he agreed.
She lingered over the big V-8 engine, admiring the cleanliness of it, touching the fuel injection ports, which meant she had to stand on an old wooden Coca-Cola box to lean down into the compact engine. "Blair, men talk. What are they saying?"
"Oh," he waved his hand, "I'm not in the inner circle." He took a breath.
"You know I value your judgment. You were born and bred here and, uh . . ." He stopped for a moment. "I find myself in a delicate situation."
"Too many women, too little time." Harry laughed.
He laughed, too. Harry relaxed him. "Not exactly, but close. Over the years we've become friends and I think I would have committed more blunders without you. I'm afraid I'm heading for a real cock-up, as the Brits say."
"Little Mim."
"Yes." He glanced up at the sky. "See, it's like this: women accuse men of being superficial over looks. Trust me. Women are equally as superficial."
"You would know." She smiled at the unbelievably handsome model.
Blair flew all over the world for photo shoots. The biggest names in men's fashions wanted him.
"You're not going to put up a fight? You're not going to tell me men are worse than women?"
"Nope." Harry jammed her hands in her back pockets. "Now tell me what's going on."
"Little Mim has a crush on me. Okay, I've dealt with crushes before and I like her. Don't get me wrong. But over the weekend I was at a fund-raiser and, of course, the Sanburnes were there. Big Mim pulled me away from the crowd, took me down to the rathskeller, and closed the door."
"This is getting serious," Harry remarked. The rathskeller was a small stone room in the basement of the Farmington Country Club.
"She offered me cash if I would stay away from Marilyn. She said modeling was not a suitable profession for her son-in-law."
"No!" Harry blurted out.
"I make a lot of money, but let's just say my business is timesensitive. I'd be a liar if I said I'm immune to a big bribe. And I've had enough scrapes and breaks to my body to wake me up to that fact. My Teotan Partnership Investment is doing very well, though. But really, I was shocked that the old girl would try to buy me off."
Through various twists and turns Blair wound up sole director of a corporation originally set up to sell water toAlbemarleCounty . However, he'd begun bottling it and selling the mountain water-purified, of course-in specialty stores. This proved lucrative.
"You don't need her money." Harry thought to herself that it must be nice.
"No. But the Sanburnes control Crozet. If I spurn Little Mim, I'm cooked. If I ignore Big Mim's wishes, I'm cooked."
"M-m-m." Harry removed her hands from her pockets and rubbed them together absentmindedly. "Do you like Marilyn?" She called Little Mim by her Christian name.
"Yes."
"Love?"
"No. Not yet, if ever. That takes time for me." He pursed his lips.
"Well, squire Little Mim around to local functions, spend some time with her and her family. Sometimes when you really get to know someone things look different. You look different, too."
He paused and rephrased his thoughts. "If I'm up-front about getting to know her daughter, the family, Mim will take it better if I choose to spend my life with her daughter?" he questioned, then quietly added, "If the relationship should progress, I mean."
"He is a Yankee." Mrs. Murphy laughed because Blair missed the subtlety of Harry's suggestion.
"Because he's only thinking of his feelings about Little Mim." Pewter had gotten a spot of grease on her paw, licked it, and spit.
"Go drink water," Tucker told her.
The gray cat scampered into the barn, standing on her hind legs to drink out of the water bucket in the wash stall.
"He's missing the point, that this gives Little Mim and Big Mim plenty of time to assess him." Tucker stood up and shook. "Mom's betting on Little Mim getting the stars out of her eyes."
"No. I think Mom is giving everyone a chance to draw closer or gracefully decline. If he walks away from Mim's offer she'll be furious. And if he took it he'd be held in contempt by her forever."
"He's in a fix. You don't think Little Marilyn knows?"
"Tucker, it would kill her."
"Yeah."
Pewter mumbled back, "Let's drag that grease gun into the woods."
"You'll have even more grease on you."
Pewter eyed the dog. "I hate it when you're smarter than I am."
All three animals laughed.
". . . no hurry," Harry continued. "If you go slow and be honest, things will turn out for the best."
"I knew you'd know the right thing to do."
"And pay court to Big Mim even if she's cold to you. She loves the attention."
"Right." He folded himself back into his car. "Glad you fi-nally got a new truck."
"Me, too."
He drove back down the driveway without fully realizing that now he really wanted Little Mim precisely because her mother refused him. Suddenly Little Mim was a challenge. She was desirable. People are funny that way.
As soon as he was out of sight, Harry raced for the phone in the tackroom.
"Susan."
"What?"
"I was just thinking about how people say one thing and do another-sometimes on purpose and sometimes because they don't know what they're doing."
"Yes . . ." Susan drew out the yes.
"Well, I was just talking to Blair about another matter but it made me think about people concealing their true intentions. Like Charlie's behavior toward Marcy Wiggins at the shoot."
"He didn't pay much attention to her at the shoot." Susan thought back.
"Exactly," Harry said.
"H-m-m." Susan thought it over.
"Let's raise the flag and see who salutes." Harry's voice filled with excitement.
"What do you mean?" Susan wondered.
"Leave it to me." Harry almost smacked her lips.
"She's incorrigible." The tiger cat sighed.
11
By eight-thirty the next morning, they had all the mail sorted and popped in the mailboxes.
Harry and Mrs. Hogendobber felt wonderful. Their job was easier in the summer. The catalogue glut diminished-only to return like a bad penny in the fall. A rise in summer postcards couldn't compete with the tidal wave of mail from Thanksgiving to Christmas.
Harry enjoyed reading postcards before sliding them in the boxes.Maine , an excellent place to be in mid-August, claimed four Crozetians.Nova Scotia , that exquisite appendage ofCanada , had one. The rest of the postcards were from beach places, with the occasional glossy photo of a Notre Dame gargoyle from a student on vacation dutifully writing home to Mom and Dad.
Miranda had baked her specialty, orange-glazed cinnamon buns. The two women nibbled as they worked. Miranda swept the floor while Harry dusted down the backs of the metal mailboxes.
"Why do humans have flat faces?" Pewter lazily inquired, made tired by this ceaseless productivity.
"Ran into a cosmic door." Mrs. Murphy cackled.
"If they had long faces it would throw them out of balance," Tucker said.
"What do you mean?" Mrs. Murphy didn't follow the canine line of reasoning.
"They'd be falling forward to keep up with their faces. Flat faces help them since they walk on two legs. Can't have too much weight in front."
"You know, Tucker, you amaze me," Mrs. Murphy admiringly purred as she strolled over from the back door.
Harry had put an animal door in the back door so the kids could come and go. Each time an animal entered or left, a little flap was heard. Mrs. Murphy was considering a stroll in Miranda's garden. Insect patrol. She changed her mind to sit next to Tucker.