Diane Davidson - Sticks & Scones

She came walking up the steps by the dentist’s office as stealthily as a cat, and just as quietly. Had she acquired get-around-in-the-jungle skills? Her eyes scanned the upper lot for Tom. Her distinguished, Jackie Kennedy face and dark hair streaked with gray once again gave me a frisson.

I believed Tom when he said he hadn’t met with Sara Beth - or done worse - in the last month. She was a woman from his past who’d just appeared out of nowhere. What I wasn’t sure of was whether he still loved her. She was certainly one of the most striking women I’d ever seen, especially since in twenty-degree weather she was dressed only in a clingy gray turtleneck and long gray pants. I look fat in gray, and never wear it. Sara Beth didn’t look fat in anything. I sighed, and wondered. The ability to survive cold, the ability to move stealthily. Despite my first impression that she was a nonshooting type, had she also learned the jungle skill of killing a target?

Before I could chicken out, I assumed a friendly demeanor and walked up to her.

“Please don’t run away,” were the first words out of my mouth. “I’m Tom’s wife. Won’t you just talk to me? I’m not going to turn you in. For anything.”

She lifted her chin. She wore no makeup, and looked younger and better for it. Stop it, I scolded myself. In her quiet, rusty-from-disuse English, Sara Beth said, “I am sorry I ever tried to contact Tom.”

“You’ve got a few minutes, right? Please. Just come sit in my van and talk. I need to talk to you about Tom being shot,” I added, studying her face.

She turned so pale I thought she might faint. Startled, she almost lost her balance. When she faltered, I tucked my arm in hers and led her to the van.

Once I’d coaxed her inside, I turned the heat on full blast. She rubbed her hands and shivered.

“I’m Goldy Schulz,” I said.

She gave me a slight smile. “That’s what you said last time. What happened to Tom?”

“Some bad guy shot him Monday morning. He was hit in the shoulder, but he’s mobile and recovering.”

“Was this before or after the window?”

“After. Do you know anything about either shooting?”

Her face darkened and she stared at the windshield. “No. I just came here to get supplies and have my teeth fixed.”

“Here?” I asked calmly. I tried to make my voice soothing, the better to coax out information. “You’ve been away twenty-some years. Why’d you stay in Southeast Asia all that time? Why didn’t you come home to your fiancé?”

“Look, I attempted to let him know I’d survived. Not right away, of course. It was too dangerous. I was afraid of trying to get back.”

“So you became a village doctor?”

“I did it for survival,” she replied. Her face was chiseled into seriousness, and I suddenly imagined interviewing her for some postwar documentary. Sheesh! “Stories came back about Saigon as a madhouse,” she was saying. “People were trying to get out before all hell broke loose. Many of them failed. I’d broken my back when the copter crashed. By the time I recovered, the Americans were long gone. The Vietcong weren’t going to say, ‘You forgot somebody! Come on back and pick her up!’ The village people told me I’d never get out alive.

So I stayed, and worked hard, so the villagers would want me there. So they would keep my secret. They adopted me,” she added, “and I grew to love them. The American government did a terrible thing to that country.”

“Uh, thanks. We figured that out, but only after thousands of our own soldiers died.”

“I tried to communicate with Tom. I just never had any luck. For example, fifteen years ago - “

“Fifteen years ago?”

She ran her fingers through her streaked hair. Her voice had turned calm. She was finally reciting a story she’d prepared for a long time. “Fifteen years ago I gave a letter to Tom to a French agricultural worker who showed up in the village. But the Frenchman died when he stepped on a mine beside the railroad track. After that, I didn’t try to communicate anymore, because I figured it would be too disruptive to Tom’s life. And then I had to pick up some supplies and deal with this tooth problem. Another visitor to the village told us about e-mail, so I… changed my mind and tried that once I got to the States, through a friend’s account.” The face she turned to me seemed profoundly sad. “You always think, or hope, maybe, that people haven’t changed. That somehow you can touch base with your old life. I’m sorry I did.” She hesitated. “I’d still like to see Tom, if he isn’t too badly hurt.”

Not so fast, I thought. I still have a couple of questions. Again, I reminded myself to be sweet and polite. “Do you happen to know anything about stamps? As in, the valuable kind that are so easy to fence overseas? Especially in the Far East?”

“What are you talking about? I told you, I used e-mail.” She gave me a wide-eyed Tom-marrid-a-nut look, then reached for the door handle. “I have to go. If Tom can manage, I’d like him to drive me to the airport at four o’clock this afternoon. The dental pain meds will be wearing off by then, and talking will be a challenge. But I’d like to see him before I go. I’m staying in the Idaho Springs Inn, under the name Sara Brand. If he’s not there, I’ll take the shuttle bus.” She opened the door and swiveled one of her slender legs out of the van.

“Wait,” I said. “Just … tell me, do you still love him? Are you here because you’re trying to steal him back? I have to know.”

She lowered her chin and gave me the full benefit of her intense brown eyes. “We had a good relationship, but it’s been over for a long time. Enjoy what you have, Goldy. He’s a good man.”

Without saying goodbye, she trotted toward the dentist’s office.

Great. Either she was telling the truth, or she was an incredibly good actress. Did I care? I wasn’t sure.

The maxim When you feel really low, focus on the food had always proved useful. This time would be no exception. I torqued the van out of the lot and drove to the grocery store, where I bought not one but two quarts of nondairy lime sorbet for lactose-intolerant Howie Lauderdale. I knew he probably wouldn’t eat all sixty-four ounces, even if he was a teenager. But a Caterer’s Basic Rule of Dessert is that you must have plenty of backup food, even for a single special-request treat. Then if eight more folks communicate a sudden desire for lime sorbet, they won’t feel cheated when you say you don’t have any.

I hit the brakes hard halfway through the store parking lot. Behind me, a VW Bug beeped. What had I just said to myself? If eight more folks communicate a desire …

I pulled into a vacant parking space. What had Sara Beth said about my husband? I tried to communicate with Tom. I just never had any luck.

Who else ran out of luck communicating? How about Andy Balachek? First by a letter to Tom at the department, then by e-mail, and finally by telephone, that young man had been obsessed with staying in touch. The last time we’d heard from Andy had been via cell phone from Central City. Or had it?

You have to think the way the thief does.

Trudy Quincy had been taking in our mail all week. Was it possible Andy had somehow tried to communicate, and we just hadn’t had any luck receiving it?

Heart in mouth, I threw the gearshift into drive, stepped on the gas, and thankfully only skidded once while racing over the snow-packed streets back to our house. I avoided looking at our plywood-covered window, leapt from the van, and hopped through the new snow to the Quincys’ house. Please let my neighbor be home, I prayed. Please let her not think I’ve gone bananas.

When Trudy opened her door, she was cuddling our cat on her left shoulder. Scout gave me that slit-eyed feline greeting: Who the hell are you? Then he snuggled in closer to Trudy.