Melinda Wells: The Proof is in the Pudding

“Hi, Lew. It’s Della Carmichael.”

“Hey, there, Mrs. C. Wha’ chu cookin’ up this late?”

I told him that the Auto Club tow truck was going to be arriving soon with a red VW and asked him to have it put in one of Car Guy’s slots.

“Would you tell him that I’d like to know what’s wrong with it, and if he’d be able to do the work? Ask him to call me at home tomorrow. You have the number.”

“Will do.”

“Thank you, Lew. Good night. Or, I guess I should say ‘good morning.’ ”

“It’s all the same to me,” he said.

I disconnected the call as I watched the Auto Club truck pull away in the predawn darkness and head north up Laurel Canyon Boulevard with Eileen’s little car behind it.

Eileen sighed, and I turned to see her staring up Rothdell Terrace, in the direction of what she’d called Keith Ingram’s mini Swiss chateau.

“You said you left your purse at the creep’s house. Why don’t I go wake up that jerk and get it for you?”

“No,” Eileen said. “I can’t look at him.”

“I understand that. Why don’t I call him tomorrow and arrange to pick it up for you?”

She nodded. “Thank you.” Her eyes were filling with tears. “This is so awful. What am I going to do?”

I put my arm around her shoulders and gave her an encouraging squeeze. “Don’t think about it right now. I’ll figure out something.”

My voice sounded confident, but it was sheer bravado. The truth was that I didn’t have even the beginning of an idea how I was going to get Eileen out of this awful situation.

Tired as I was, I still didn’t sleep soundly. When my doorbell rang at seven o’clock on Tuesday morning, only three hours after I’d finally been able to go to bed, I was already more than half awake.

Tuffy, who had been sleeping at the foot of the bed, sat up, on full alert. I heard a low growl in his throat.

My first thought was that my visitor was Phil Logan, bringing the designer dresses he’d borrowed for me to wear to the Wednesday night gala, but this was a little early, even for Phil. And Tuffy never growled at Phil.

So who was at the door?

The bell rang again. Tuffy followed as I hurried, bare-footed, to the front door, struggling into a robe as I went.

A glance through the front window revealed a young man I’d never seen before. He was in his early twenties, wore jeans and a T-shirt that advertised some rock group. Its name was partially obscured by the young man’s leather jacket. A bright green and yellow helmet was tucked beneath his right arm. A Barneys New York shopping bag dangled from his other hand.

With my seventy-pound black standard poodle-an intimidating sight to strangers-beside me, I opened the front door a few inches. “Yes?”

The young man raised the shopping bag. “Delivery.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a delivery,” he said. “For Eileen O’Hara.”

I opened the door wider. “I’ll take it.”

He handed it to me.

“If you’ll wait just a moment-” I was going to say that I wanted to give him a tip, but he either didn’t listen or didn’t care because he was hurrying back down my front path to the street, where he’d parked a motorcycle.

The Barneys shopping bag wasn’t fastened at the top. I saw that it contained a purse I recognized as Eileen’s.

“Who was that?”

I turned to see Eileen. She didn’t look as though she had slept much either.

I took the purse out of the bag. “I think this is yours.”

She didn’t reach for it, but instead stared at the closed front door. “Was that…? Did… he bring it?”

“A messenger,” I said.

Eileen took the purse from my hand, opened it, and fingered the contents. “No note. I guess he’s too cautious to write something I might show to his fiancée.”

“You wouldn’t do it,” I said.

“He doesn’t know that. He doesn’t know me at all.” She clamped her lips together in an angry line.

“Ingram knew you well enough to realize you’d never agree to being taped.” I folded the paper shopping bag into quarters.

Eileen indicated the Barneys bag. “What are you going to do with that?”

“Right into the trash. Keith Ingram touched it. This isn’t something I want to use again.”

“I’m glad to see your passion for recycling things has a limit,” Eileen said.

“Honey, let’s forget him for now. I’ll make us some breakfast.”

She shook her head. “No thanks. I haven’t got any classes today so I’m going back to bed for a while.” Mumbling that she’d see me later, she went down the hall to her room.

Going to bed sounded like a good idea to me, but when I turned around I discovered that Emma, my little calico cat, had joined Tuffy and that both of them were staring at me. The message in their eyes was unmistakable: They wanted breakfast.

“Okay, guys,” I told them. “You win.”

After letting Tuffy out for a quick trip to the backyard-the prelude to our usual long morning walk-I fed the two of them. I was now too thoroughly awake to return to bed, so I took a shower and put on a fresh T-shirt and pair of sweatpants.

Lack of enough sleep tends to make me hungry. I tell myself that it’s my body compensating for loss of rest by craving food for energy. This morning I also told myself that cooking-working with my hands on an old, familiar dish like stuffed French toast-would clear my head to think about Eileen’s problem. The only thing about the situation that gave me any comfort at all was the fact that we had some time to come up with a solution. By his own stated timetable, Ingram wouldn’t be coming after Eileen for at least a month or two. Still, there was a huge threat hanging over Eileen’s head, and I wasn’t going to rest easy until it was removed.

As the coffee brewed and I was whipping up the milk, vanilla extract, and egg mixture, I thought about Ingram. I didn’t know enough about him yet to devise some counterthreat.

I was using my paring knife to carve one-inch-long openings in the bottom crust of French bread slices and scoop out a little of the insides when the doorbell rang again.

What now?

I turned off the heat under the pan in which two pats of butter were melting and hurried to the door.

This time when I glanced through the front window I saw Phil Logan pressing the bell. Over his other arm, he carried three long garment bags.

When I opened the door, Phil greeted me with a pleased expression and indicated the garment bags. “It’s hard to get sample gowns for somebody who isn’t a size two, but fortunately there’s this new Spanish designer who appreciates women with curves, so I got you a couple of…” He lifted his chin, and wrinkled his nose. “What’s that wonderful aroma-and do you have enough for me?”

“There’s plenty.”

I led Phil to my bedroom, where he hung the garment bags on the bathroom door, and followed me into the kitchen. Briefly, I considered asking Phil for information about Ingram, but I decided against that. Phil would want to know why, and I couldn’t tell him.

Unaware that I was worried about anything, Phil set the table for breakfast. He had eaten here many times over the months, and knew where the plates, napkins, and cutlery were. As soon as he’d completed that task, he joined me at the counter beside the stove.

“What are you making?”

“Stuffed French toast.”

“Stuffed? How can you stuff toast?”

“You can’t use an ordinary presliced loaf, but if you use French bread, it’s simple,” I said, demonstrating. “I just insert a spoonful of fruit preserves into the pockets I’ve cut in the bread slices, spread the filling around inside, and put the little rectangle of bottom crust I opened up back into place. That seals the preserves inside the bread. Then I dredge the bread in the egg and milk mixture, and put it into the heated skillet.”