Diane Davidson - Killer Pancake

“Whatever’s on sale at the grocery store.”

Dusty couldn’t help it, she put her hand on her chest and began to giggle. “That must be how you got to be friends with Frances Markasian! You know, that reporter you introduced me to?”

“The woman in red who was here earlier, right? The one I introduced you to yesterday?”

“Yeah, spending lots of money, I couldn’t believe it. She sure has changed her tune. Maybe she has a new boyfriend. Did you see that article she wrote on cosmetics for the Mountain Journal! I went home and looked it up, to see if it was the same person. I swear, she must be the queen of the skinflints. She wrote that people should just use Cetaphil, witch hazel, and drugstore moisturizer. Can you imagine?”

“I must have missed that issue. When was it?”

Before she could reply, Harriet, who had been writing in the large ledger, closed it with a firm slap and came over.

“I remember one time,” she said in her honeylike voice, certainly not a voice I would associate with someone in her late sixties, “when we had a widow come in. She was fairly young, and all she’d ever used was drugstore makeup.” She shook her head at me beneficently, as if to say, You see, being a soap-user isn’t the stupidest thing we’ve ever seen here . “That poor woman … it just brings tears to my eyes to remember.” I looked at Harriet’s eyes. They were wet, all right. “Of course, her skin was a mess—too dry in one place, too oily in another. Her foundation didn’t match her skin tone, she wore bright green eyeshadow, and her cheeks were so caked with blush, she looked like she had scarlet fever. I sold her our complete line. She had the insurance money, you see, and she could do whatever she wanted. A thousand dollars’ worth of cosmetics I sold to that woman, and she was so happy! In less than an hour.” She reached for a tissue and dabbed at her eyes.

“I’ll bet you just loved that, Harriet,” Dusty commented.

Harriet ignored this. “Oh, it was wonderful,” she said to me. “Really touching, what I did for that woman. She looked beautiful when she walked out of here. She looked perfect.”

Down the counter, a woman began to try out the perfume testers. She was wearing what looked to be some kind of designer sundress with big black squiggles on a white background. Below her elaborately streaked and curled hair, gold necklaces dripped around her neck and a gold bracelet with bells tinkled when she shook her wrist with each new perfume sample. Dusty put down her pen and moved toward her. Catapulted out of a post-green-eyeshadow reverie, Harriet took two quick steps in Dusty’s direction, put a hand on her shoulder, and snapped a loud “Excuse me!” before pushing past her to be the first one to stand in front of the Woman with Bucks.

“Whoa,” I said when Dusty returned, crestfallen. “What was that all about?”

“Don’t worry,” said Dusty bitterly. “I have Harriet’s pump prints all up my back. And I’m the one who has to worry about the sales figures.” She gestured to the big blue volume in which Harriet had been writing. “Every time I look at the ledger book, I break out in a sweat.”

“Does she walk over everybody that way?”

“If you’re in her way,” murmured Dusty as she held up a bottle of foundation to my cheek to see if it matched my skin tone. Shaking her head, she clinked the bottle back into its drawer and picked out another. “You know this Rejuvenation we’re selling?” I nodded. She continued, “Our sales goal on it is twenty-three hundred dollars a month per sales associate.” She pointed to the ledger. “Today’s the third of July and Harriet has already sold two thousand dollars of the stuff this month . That’s what, eighteen total hours of sales time? Incredible. Of course, she says the most awful things to customers.” Dusty’s smile was wicked. “Claire and I figured Harriet must be at least eighty by the end of the day, since she gets older each minute when she’s trying to sell anti-aging cream.”

I unscrewed the lid on a jar of thick cream, then used the little plastic applicator to spread a dollop of the viscous, sweet-smelling stuff on the back of my hand. I said mildly, “Was Harriet jealous of Claire?”

The wicked smile on Dusty’s lips traveled to her eyes. “Claire had one client, a man who’s a weird-genius kind of guy, who spent a lot of money. You mentioned him, he was here before—a thin, tall blond man? Anyway, never mind that it was his wife’s money, this guy spent it like crazy, buying stuff for his wife, I guess, but always only from Claire. He wouldn’t even buy a tube of lipstick from one of the rest of us. He’d hang around here like a loyal dog, waiting until her shift. And you know how Claire was. She’d flirt and bat her eyes and just have the best old time. Or maybe you never saw her do that…. Hold still, I’m going to use this cleanser on you.”

I sat motionless while Dusty used two cotton balls to spread luscious-smelling cream over my cheeks. It felt divine. If my stomach hadn’t been growling, I would have been certain I was in heaven.

“Anyway,” she went on, “Claire would just make this guy feel like a million dollars. ‘You’re not really goin’ to buy that too! Y’goin’ t’be broke!’” Dusty’s imitation of Claire’s Australian accent was dead-on. “So. Pretty soon the wife, who spends a lot of money here herself, comes in with her husband to see why her husband’s developed such an enthusiastic interest in cosmetics all of a sudden.”

“When was all this going on?” I asked, trying to keep still as Dusty smeared lime-scented toner over my face. I slid my glance sideways to see if Harriet was having any luck with Mrs. Got-Rocks in the black and white dress.

“Watch out!” Dusty cried sharply.

Startled, I fell off the stool where I was perched. “Huh? I was just looking to see how Harriet was doing.”

“I don’t want to get this stuff in your eye! You don’t know what could happen!”

Dusty had become so suddenly flustered that I sat back slowly on the stool and opened my eyes wide. “I’m fine. Look. I love the feel of this stuff you put on me—”

Dusty took a deep breath and began to write on my ticket, or whatever it was. When I asked her what she was doing, she informed me that this was my client card. She’d record everything she sold me so that next time she could just look it up when I came in and needed new blush or whatever.

“I have to tell you honestly, Dusty, I don’t think there’s much chance that I’ll be spending a lot of time or money here….”

“Okay, close your eyes and keep them closed. I’m going to do your moisturizer.” She didn’t seem to hear me.

I obeyed. “So what happened with this man and his wife and Claire?”

Dusty finished with the moisturizer and began to dab on something else. From the position of her fingers, I guessed it was concealer. I didn’t dare open my eyes though, for fear of another eruption.

“I think Claire and the man had an affair. He was, like, smitten. I mean, the guy seemed crazed. Obsessed . I do know they broke up later, because she told me. But he still came around—you know, hanging back where he figured we wouldn’t see him. He would skulk through Shoes, watching her. I mean, who could miss him? He’s so tall, and that blondish-white hair makes him look kind of young and real cute. Okay, now I’m doing your foundation.” More scented stuff was liberally spread over my face. Pat, pat, pat. “Never tug or pull on your face,” Dusty warned sternly. “That’s what causes premature loosening of the skin around the eyes.”

Noted. Keeping my eyes closed, I inquired, “So what happened to the skulking guy? Why was he here this morning?”