Diane Davidson - The Main Corpse

“So what happened?”

“Oh my dear, so painful. The two of them actually bought some land, bought a few goats, brought investors out and had them try on cashmere sweaters, taste a little Montrachet. But the samples were from a delicatessen, and the cashmere sweaters were from Scotland. Their goats all died. They unloaded the land. The investors, including yours truly, got back less than ten cents on the dollar.”

No wonder she was so pleased with Prospect’s recent run of disastrous luck. “Sounds like maybe it was just a bad investment,” I murmured.

She gave me an incredulous look. “I looked up the deed for that land this year, although I wasn’t smart enough to do it back then. Prospect doubled its money on it. Maybe they were sincere, maybe it was all a mistake, who was I to judge? Either way, this winter, I alerted the state consumer fraud people.”

I held my breath. “What did they find?”

“Nothing. They said there was a statute of limitations problem and their staff had just been cut back to the bone. Plus, I was the only one who’d made any noise. I straightened out the last of the fruit skewers and tried to think what to ask next. “Did you keep… seeing Tony during that time?”

“What was I supposed to do when all his damn goats were dying? I’d never seen a man so sad. He chalked it up as a loss, and he and Albert quietly got out of the goat business. I didn’t get suspicious until the following year, when the two of them were yakking away in WorkNet about selling ostrich eggs to all the would-be ostrich farmers. One day, I got up my courage and cornered Albert. I told him in no uncertain terms that if he and his partner didn’t get out of animal husbandry, I’d write up the goat fiasco for the WorkNet newsletter. Albert told Tony I was upset. Tony said, Oh, sweetheart, can’t we go out for dinner? So I went, but I wouldn’t give them a dime for ostriches. Now what I don’t know is when the two of them started investing in regional companies. Prospect Financial Partners did great when Medigen went public. And might have done great with mining gold, who knows?”

“Sheesh. But,” and I tried to sound thoughtful, “didn’t you start dating Tony again? As in this year?”

Her cheeks colored. “A couple of times, why? Why shouldn’t I try to stay friends with Tony? He’s a part of the business community, whether I like it or not.”

“I’m just saying it doesn’t sound as if you’re friends.”

“Well, I … I mean I guess Marla is the jealous type, or something.” She pressed the plastic wrap tightly over her plate. “Tony and I haven’t seen each other in ages.”

“You saw him at the mine party, didn’t you? Of course, I was busy, but I thought I saw you talking to Albert – “

Eileen glanced out the window, and I had the sudden feeling that she didn’t wish to discuss that particular conversation. “Just casual, I assure you, Goldy. Trying to bury the hatchet. I’m not an investor in the mine – they just invited me for. : . social reasons, I think.” She turned her gaze from the window and winked at me. The wicked gleam was back in her eyes. “I certainly hope Marla didn’t loan either of them any money. I’d never entrust either of those guys with my money again. Never. But listen, I have to go. You can just call me about next week.”

I felt a headache looming, and groaned. “Okay. But… what worries me is that I think Marla wants to make the relationship with Tony permanent. I mean, they have tiffs, but –”

“Well, maybe she’ll reconsider now that Tony’s three and a half mil lighter. I promise, Goldy. Those Prospect Financial guys are bad karma. I never take a bite of goat cheese without thinking of them.”

10

I raced home to prepare a dish for Marla and Tony’s evening meals out on the range. Or rather, by the trout-swollen brook. In the spirit of the taste testing I’d be doing later, and also because it could be such a comfort in rainy weather, I decided on homemade chicken soup. I chopped mountains of leeks, onions, carrots, and celery, then gently stirred them into a golden pool of olive oil along with the chicken breasts. If I hadn’t been making the soup for cardiac patient Marla, of course, I would have used unsalted butter instead of oil. Small sacrifice.

Rainy Season Chicken Soup

2 dried porcini mushrooms

2 tablespoons butter

2 leeks, white part only, split, rinsed, and diced

1 medium-size carrot, diced

1 medium-size onion, diced

1 large celery rib, diced

2 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves

2 tablespoons all purpose flour

2 tablespoons dry white wine 4 cups chicken stock, divided (preferably the homemade lowfat chicken stock made from the recipe in Killer Pancake)

1 cup fat-free sour cream

1 cup fideo (fine-cut egg noodles) salt and pepper

Using a small pan, bring a cup of water to boiling and drop in the porcini mushrooms. Cook uncovered over medium-high heat for 10 minutes, then drain the mushrooms, pat them dry, and slice thinly. Set aside. In a large sauté pan, melt the butter over low heat. Put in the leeks, carrot, onion, celery, and chicken, stir gently, and cover to cook over low heat for 5 minutes. Take off the cover, stir the vegetables, turn the chicken, and check for doneness. (The chicken should be about half done.) Cover and cook another 5 minutes, or until chicken is just done – not overdone. Remove the chicken from the pan and set aside to cool. Sprinkle the flour over the melted butter, vegetables, and pan juices, and stir to cook over low heat for 2 minutes. Slowly add the white wine and 2 cups of the chicken broth. Stir and cook until bubbly and thickened. Add the sour cream very slowly, and allow to cook gently while you slice the chicken into thin, bite-size pieces.

In a large frying pan, bring the remaining 2 cups of stock to boiling, and add fideo. Cook 4 minutes, or until almost done. Do not drain. Slowly add the noodle mixture to the hot vegetables and sour cream mixture. Add the chicken and the mushrooms and bring back to boiling. Serve immediately.

Serves 4.

I removed the chicken breasts when they were tender and milky white, then whisked in flour, white wine, and lowfat chicken broth. The homey scent of cooked vegetables wafted upward. My mind churned. As I sliced the chicken, I wondered how much of Tony’s character Marla really knew. Or wanted to know. But then again, as a former girlfriend, especially one who’d been jilted, Eileen Tobey was not the most reliable of sources. And besides, my own Tom had remembered Albert in connection with the goats and goat cheese, not Tony and Albert together. Maybe Eileen was indulging in some reputation-destroying back-stabbing, by exchanging the names and the players.

When the soup had cooled, I packed it into zipped plastic bags and wedged frozen ice packs between the bags in a large cardboard box. I also loaded in fruit, granola, yogurt, raw vegetables, nonfat sour cream dip, and homemade bread. As I revved up the van, I wondered if l should be the one to confront Tony about the goat story. Then again, Eileen had left out a few significant facts in her tale, including that she’d resumed dating Tony several years after the goat swindle. Nor, she said, had she alerted the consumer fraud people until after she and Tony broke up this year. Maybe Albert was the real swindler; that certainly seemed to be in line with the way he was acting now. No matter what, I thought as I pulled up in front of Sam’s Soups, I doubted this afternoon’s scheduled taste-testing would give me an opportunity for a business-oriented heart-to-heart with Tony.

“Here you are, finally,” he said, as he guided me through the tables by the bank of windows facing Aspen Meadow Lake. The bright navy-and-white interior of Sam’s Soups was meant to conjure up culinary memories of New England, I guessed, as I watched waiters and waitresses clad in sailor’s outfits zip between tables. A long fisherman’s net hung along one wall, while another festooned the ceiling. Framed posters depicting cross sections of seashells graced the other wall. And what did I hear? I moved close to a wall-mounted speaker. Yes: It was the piped-in sound of seagulls. Tony grinned proudly as I took all this in. He was his usual dapper self: white monogrammed shirt, navy pants, mustache freshly clipped, hair blown dry into a soft wave. “We’ve been waiting for you, Goldy. Sam’s chef has prepared a whole smorgasbord of soups just for you.”