Diane Davidson - Sticks & Scones

Michaela made her voice reassuring. “Goldy, I promise, I know Howie. He’s a good kid. Arch is definitely up to fencing him.”

Julian murmured, “C’mon, Goldy. Let him do it. The kids wear masks. Everyone will be there. It’s an honor for Arch to go first, to fence with Howie.”

“Yeah, Mom,” Arch cried. “Stop making me out to be a wimp.”

I gestured helplessly. With the three of them staring at me, I said, “Okay, I give up. Fence away. But it wouldn’t surprise me if Buddy was paying his son to hurt you.”

Arch snorted. Michaela silently shook her head. After a few moments of uncomfortable silence, she said she’d bring the ice and drink coolers up to the Great Hall. Arch offered to help, and they both left.

Julian and I now set to our work in earnest, putting in the veal for a slow roasting, timing the reheating of the curry, rice, and potatoes, and deciding on the flow of the buffet. Julian got the chafers going and set up the electrified serving platters. This was the third time this week we’d transported keep-stuff-hot equipment hither and yon. No wonder the medieval folks built their kitchen close to the Great Hall.

As my last culinary act before the guests arrived, I prepared the curry condiments. Americans rarely take more than a spoonful of chutney, raisins, or peanuts from that classic dozen side dishes known as a twelve-boy. But they feel gypped if they cannot at least survey lots of extra bowls containing chopped bacon, chopped hard-cooked egg yolks, chopped hard-cooked egg whites, shredded coconut, crushed pineapple, chopped green onion, sweet pickle relish, orange marmalade, and yogurt.

Just before six, Eliot and Sukie breezed into the kitchen. Eliot had changed from the golf outfit into another dapper double-breasted suit - this one charcoal gray - and a snowy white shirt. Sukie’s blond hair was swept up in an elegant French twist, and she glowed in a long, bright-red wool dress. She retrieved a silver tray, glasses, and napkins, while Eliot clanked bottles around in the dining room and proudly emerged with two bottles of vintage dry sherry. They announced that they were on their way to the gatehouse to greet guests in the grand fashion. Murmuring that the kids needed to be welcomed in style, too, Julian snagged two twelve-packs of soft drinks and hustled after the Hydes.

I dashed up to the Great Hall with the covered curry side dishes and quickly checked the buffet, the tables, the makeshift bars, the ice, and the bottles of water and wine. Eliot had straightened the fencing mats and marked out the shuttlecock court with masking tape. Michaela had set up a small table for the trophies. Overhead, the chandeliers flickered. The gold trophies, silver plates, and crystal glasses reflected the glimmering light. Everything looked perfect.

Always a bad sign.

-25-

Tom was still gone on his airport errand when John Richard and Viv Martini sashayed in, the first to arrive. Standing alone behind the makeshift bar, I was unnerved by their appearance. They glanced in my direction, then sniffed and looked away. John Richard looked handsome in an open-necked blue shirt, charcoal vest, and black pants. His twenty-nine-year-old girlfriend, slinking along in a clingy silver dress with matching spike heels, made my stomach turn over. Her dress was slit so far up the side, she should have been doing jumping jacks.

I, on the other hand, feared the worst, appearance-wise. Not only did I pale in comparison to Viv, I couldn’t bear the thought of how Tom would assess my appearance vis-ŕ-vis that of Sara Beth, with her aristocrat-in-the-Peace-Corps beauty and moral high ground. I glanced at myself in the reflection of a silver tray. Working in the hot castle kitchen had made my hair very curly. My makeup was long gone; my face shone with exertion. The cavernous Great Hall was cold, and I needed a sweater over my thin caterers’ top, not to mention a new apron, as the one I had on was liberally dappled with curry sauce.

Julian took over the bar while I dashed back to our room, dragged a comb through my hair, dabbed on makeup and lipstick, and grabbed the only sweater I’d brought, the cardigan I’d worn to Eliot’s office. As an afterthought, I seized my cell phone from its charger and dropped it into one of the sweater pockets. Reception in the castle was iffy, but carrying a phone somehow made me feel more secure.

In the kitchen, I tied on a clean apron, rechecked my list, made sure the roasts weren’t cooking too quickly, started reheating the rice, and slid the potato casseroles into the oven. In forty-five minutes, Julian and I would bring forth all the food. I launched myself back up to the Great Hall. I didn’t care if I looked like a plump little ex-wife who was also the caterer; I didn’t care how I would stack up to the tall, gorgeous nurse from the jungle. I was not going to miss Arch’s fifteen minutes of fencing fame.

“The attack in foil is like a charge,” Michaela was saying to the assembled group of parents and students. Most were listening, but a few were milling about the shuttlecock court, where no one was playing, and the penny-prick game, where someone had already swiped the Susan B. Anthony dollar. Eliot, standing to one side of the group, looked depressed.

Arch and Howie, in fencing uniforms and masks, stood on the mat. Arch had his back to me; Howie, who looked frighteningly anonymous in his mask, faced me.

“We will have Arch,” Michaela gestured in my son’s direction, “and Howie,” she nodded to the taller boy, “demonstrate attack, parry, riposte. Then one of them will charge. En garde, boys.”

Arch and Howie moved smartly back and forth, their foils clanging, their feet slapping the mat. Howie attacked. Arch swiftly parried and riposted. The spectators tightened into a semicircle in front of the mat. Watching Arch, my heart swelled with pride and I didn’t care if John Richard was only fifteen feet away. I wanted to holler, That’s my son!

Without warning, Howie leaned forward, extended his sword, and ran toward Arch. I gasped so loudly half a dozen parents turned and glared. As Howie hurled himself toward Arch, my son froze, unsure what to do.

“Stop!” I shrieked, then wished I hadn’t. Arch tumbled backward just as Howie’s sword whacked his chest, then his leg. Unable to keep his balance, Arch flailed off the mat. Howie, in full launch, could not stop. I watched helplessly as his right foot came down hard on Arch’s left ankle. Arch screamed. Howie fell on top of him.

Michaela, John Richard, Julian, Buddy Lauderdale, and I all rushed forward. Howie seemed to be unable to extricate himself from the tangle of limbs. Buddy Lauderdale wrenched his son’s arm and demanded to know if he was hurt. Howie muttered something I couldn’t hear and clumsily righted himself. Leaning over Arch, Howie kept saying that he was sorry, very sorry, and why didn’t Arch parry? I was so intensely angry that I had to restrain myself from shaking Howie Lauderdale. How could a supposedly “good kid” have taken advantage of a younger boy like this?

Tears slid out of Arch’s eyes as Michaela and I removed his mask. His cheeks had purpled, but he made no noise to indicate he was crying. Instead, he croaked, “I think my foot’s broken. Dad, is it broken? Dad?”

John Richard shoved past Buddy and Howie Lauderdale. He removed Arch’s shoe, then probed with both hands along the foot and ankle. “Hard to tell.” He looked up, not at Arch, but at Viv, who had sidled up to the action. John Richard said, “It should be x-rayed.”

Viv said, “Now?”

“I’m taking him.” It was Julian’s voice. Our friend pushed forward to kneel beside Arch, who gave him an imploring look as tears continued to flow down his dark cheeks. “The father of my best friend at Elk Park is an orthopedist,” Julian explained matter-of-factly. “Dr. Ling. He lives by the lake, five minutes from his office, where he does X rays. He made me promise if I ever needed anything, I would give him a call.”