Let There Be Suspects (3 page)

Then I heard Sid gasp. At the same moment she grabbed my arm.

“Oh, my God. Keep her away from me.”

Before I could ask what she meant, Sid tugged harder. “I mean it!”

I realized Sid wasn’t referring to our mother. Junie had stepped to one side and with a flourish, she had ushered in someone who had been hidden behind her.

Years had passed since I last glimpsed Ginger Newton, but there was no mistaking the young woman who was now standing beside my mother. I stared at cinnamon red hair, porcelain skin, and a smile so sweet my blood sugar launched into orbit. Ginger Newton, an all too frequent guest at our childhood dinner table.

Ginger Newton, the poster child for Sociopaths Anonymous.

“I mean it. Keep her away from me, Aggie,” Sid whispered as her fingers dug ditches in my arm. “Or I swear I won’t be responsible for the consequences.”

2

Ginger Newton became a part of our lives when she was only four years old. That was the year Ginger’s mother, “Fig,” a stained glass artist, started traveling the craft show circuit, a circuit that ended twelve years later when Fig drove off a mountain pass in a Colorado snowstorm. The alcohol level in her blood hadn’t been quite high enough to serve as antifreeze.

I’m not sure if Fig took one look at Junie and saw a soft touch, or if Junie took one look at ragged, undernourished Ginger and knew she had to intervene. Whichever way it happened, that first summer Ginger moved into our travel trailer while Fig tried unsuccessfully to piece her life back together. Fig created the most stunningly original windows I have ever seen, but her life was a sorry collage of broken promises.

Ginger, who had never had regular meals, bedtimes, or unqualified love, thrived on Junie’s steady diet of all three. But Ginger had already learned that manipulation was the key to survival. Ginger looked at Sid, who had also turned four that year, and saw a spoiled youngest child who was not happy to share her exalted place in our family. Sid looked at Ginger and saw the most serious competition of her young life. Junie, who puts Pollyanna to shame, looked at the two little girls and envisioned a lifelong friendship.

How wrong can one woman be?

Now even as my sister’s expensive French manicure made deeper inroads into my protesting flesh, I glimpsed a mental slide show of the problems Ginger had caused poor Sid, who is seven years younger than me. The mysteriously broken toys; the baiting that always ended just moments before Junie walked into the room; Ginger’s pathetic tears when my desperate sister resorted to shouting. Then later, as Ginger repeatedly left and rejoined our family, the lies Ginger told Sid’s girlfriends; the rumor about Sid that she started with the football team; the teachers who punished Sid for crimes Ginger had committed.

And
almost
the most memorable of all, the high school heartthrob Ginger stole right out from under Sid’s nose. Just in time for the prom.

I’m as much a fan of forgiveness as I am of world peace. But I’m also aware of the odds. Maybe we’re all technically grown-ups, but at times like this, I’m afraid we are, at heart, still the same outraged little girls.

Junie has a high, lilting voice that carries a hundred yards farther than necessary. Today it probably carried to Columbus. “Isn’t this terrific? Ginger and Cliff live just outside Indianapolis. It was so easy for me to stop by on my way and guide them here. Cliff?” Junie turned and motioned, and a man appeared. “Girls, Ed, meet Cliff Grable. Cliff and Ginger were married last year.”

A man in his mid- to late thirties stepped up from the porch. He was tall and thin, with a hesitant smile and ordinary features embellished with wire-rimmed glasses. I watched a prominent Adam’s apple bounce as he swallowed convulsively. Cliff Grable, who was already going gray, was as average to look at as Ginger was extraordinary. Our pathetic, ragged four-year-old was now a voluptuous red-head of the Julianne Moore variety. Cliff was more Richard Benjamin than Brad Pitt.

Cliff stepped forward and extended his hand to no one in particular. I was closest and knew I had to be first. I wrenched my arm from Sid’s grasp and stepped forward to shake his hand. “I’m Aggie, Cliff. Welcome to our house.” Then, before my slide show could progress any further, I turned to my ersatz foster sister and took her hand. “And Ginger. It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?”

Ginger was dewy-eyed and breathless with emotion, but if it serves a purpose, Ginger can have a good cry over her grocery list. “Agate, you’ve hardly changed at all.”

Junie clapped her plump little hands, all fingers of which were glittering with rings. “I just knew you would be so surprised. But how could we have a reunion without our darling Ginger?”

Let me count the ways
.

I struggled to find something to say, but Ed, who has occasionally thrown himself between warring factions at weddings and wakes, stepped up to the plate. He introduced himself to Cliff, kissed Junie’s cheek, then Ginger’s. I remembered the last time Ginger and Ed were in the same room. Junie had invited Ginger to our wedding. Ginger had taken a fancy to one of the wedding gifts. Ed had quietly taken it back.

I motioned Deena and Teddy forward to meet Cliff and Ginger, but I didn’t fall into the trap of introducing Ginger as their aunt. Since Sid is a healthy twenty-eight, there are a lot of years ahead when I don’t want every sisterly phone conversation to begin with “I can’t believe you . . .!”

The girls were polite to Ginger and Cliff and ecstatic to see their grandmother. With one at each arm they tugged Junie into the living room to view our Christmas tree. That left Vel, Sid, Ed, and me to face the Grables alone.

Vel, who always does her duty, stepped forward. There were no dimples with this smile, and her eyes were the color of sleet. But she put out her hand and murmured a greeting. Then she stepped back and waited.

Ginger’s smile was cotton candy cloying. She held her hand out to Sid. “And Cliff, this is Sid. We grew up together. Just like twins. Sid, it seems like forever.”

Sid’s eyes blazed, but the manners Junie had drilled into us took control and she, too, extended her hand. The two brushed fingertips. I swear an electrical charge passed between them. Then Sid shook more naturally with Cliff.

“I’m afraid we’re just about to have an influx of guests,” Ed said. “In fact we have to change before they get here.”

“Oh, Junie told us about the open house,” Ginger said. “I hope you don’t mind, but I whipped up a little something to add to your table. I’ve been working on recipes for my next cookbook. Have you had the opportunity to try Kobe beef?”

Even after a year of Emerald Springs, I’m not such a rube that I don’t know what this means. I saw dollar signs piling on dollar signs. Kobe is the most expensive premium beef on the market, a product of a prime breed of Japanese cattle. I suspected that if Ginger was telling the truth, this might be the first Kobe beef to cross our city limits.

As for the cookbook? For once I can be fairly sure Ginger is telling the truth. For years Junie has told us about Ginger’s success as an author and cooking show host. In the fall during my short career as a bookseller, I had ordered Ginger’s first cookbook for a customer, although I had been afraid to try any of the recipes myself. Old habits.

Before I could reply Junie twinkled back into the room. “Oh, just wait until you see what Ginger brought you. I swear, she’s made me a carnivore again. I’ve never in my life eaten anything so marvelous.” Junie put an arm around Vel and another around Sid and pulled them to her. Then she released them and grabbed me.

It’s hard not to love my mother. She’s Glinda the Good, Joan of Arc, and Georgia O’Keefe all rolled into one. Attila the Hun would fall captive under Junie’s spell. She has never drawn a breath, uttered a word, taken a step that was not 100 percent from her heart. She may look flighty. Like many creative people her mind is a delicate butterfly that won’t light for more than a moment. But Junie’s affections are deep and genuine. Although she found she couldn’t live with any of the five men she married, she adored them all and probably does to this day.

I hugged her hard, then let her go. “You’ll be in Deena’s room. But I don’t know where . . .” I glanced up at Ginger and Cliff.

“Don’t worry about us,” Ginger purred. “Cliff and I are staying at the Emerald Springs Hotel.” She took his arm, the first time she had touched him since their arrival. “We don’t want to intrude.”

Nor did I want them to, but I’ll admit I felt a twinge. Had Ginger been my real sister I would gladly have found room for her somewhere.

“Cliff and I will bring in our little delicacy,” Ginger said. “You scoot now and change your clothes.”

I glanced at Sid, noted again the fury in her eyes, and knew what the immediate problem was. “Junie,” I said too loudly, “let Sid show you her incredible fruitcake before you go upstairs. I don’t know if there’ll be a bite left once everybody arrives.”

“My little Sid? A gourmet cook? Just like Ginger.” Junie looked thrilled. I was afraid to look at Sid. Junie left for the dining room with Vel and Sid in tow, and Ed and I scrambled up the stairs to don our party clothes.

Once we were in our bedroom Ed tried hard not to smile. I punched him once in the arm, just because he was there and enjoying himself.

He held up his hands in surrender. “Okay, I was a disadvantaged only child. Nobody ever wanted to kill anybody in my house.”

“Disadvantaged my eyebrow! You’re fifth-generation Harvard.” I stripped off my jeans and sweatshirt and grabbed the black dress I planned to wear, picking Moonpie fur off the hem as I struggled to pull the dress over my head. Immersed in a thundercloud of velour I could barely hear Ed’s reply.

“But I only got to imagine these kind of family dynamics. Think what I’m learning.”

It was lucky for him that I had forgotten to untie the belt. By the time I found it, and saw daylight again, Ed was on his way downstairs properly clothed.

I couldn’t believe Junie had been foolish enough to think any of us wanted Ginger present at our family reunion.

Pause.

Okay, I
could
believe it. I’m sure that if and when the subject comes up Junie will say she can’t even imagine her daughters are hanging onto childhood squabbles. And if they are, then this visit is exactly what’s needed to clear the air.

Junie never gave enough credence to Sid’s problems with Ginger. To this day I don’t think she understands how badly Sid needed her help and support. But Ginger was far too clever to misbehave in front of Junie. I’m sure Junie saw Sid’s complaints in the same light I see Teddy’s. The natural whining of a child who doesn’t want to share.

Although we had fifteen minutes to go, the doorbell rang downstairs and I experienced a moment of pure panic. I had carefully planned this open house, choosing the first day of the children’s holiday break, selecting a time when people who are still going in to work could stop by on the way home, debating what to serve and exactly how much of the congregation to invite. In the end I had decided in favor of extending the invitation to everyone, assuming that people will move in and out over the two-hour span of the party. It’s nearly Christmas, after all, and surely there are trees to decorate, presents to wrap, and carols to sing elsewhere.

Now I almost felt nostalgic for that chalk outline that had kept people away for so long. The house looked wonderful; the food was remarkable. My girls understood that this was an important event and we needed their full cooperation.

But I could almost feel the house trembling under the weight of suppressed emotions. I just hoped it didn’t explode until the last parishioners were on their way home.

 
As it turns out, I’d been given a short respite before guests arrived. Bix Minard had been at our door. I found him in our kitchen, pawing through the refrigerator to see if anything remotely appealing had appeared.

It’s a measure of how much Sid values Bix that despite Ginger’s arrival, she could still smile brightly at this new man in her life, a smile that didn’t even dent his ennui.

I was sure Bix was starving. This morning our golden-haired guest had refused Vel’s freshly roasted Columbian coffee—he prefers Costa Rican—my vegetarian sausage—Bix does not eat “fake” meat—and Ed’s scrambled eggs. Our eggs, it seems, are not from genuine free-range hens. How he knows this without examining their teensy little chicken pedometers is the mystery of the day.

“Nothing much has changed in there,” I told him. “But the table is overflowing. As soon as the party starts you can eat to your heart’s content.”

He glanced at me with all the warmth of Frosty the Snowman. And now that I think about it, our boy Bix actually looks a bit like Frosty. Bix doesn’t have a carrot nose, but his does protrude noticeably. He may have been hot stuff on the lacrosse field at Princeton, but since his glory days, Bix has developed a Frosty-like paunch. Even his gray v-neck sweater, layered over a striped T-shirt and a crisply ironed dress shirt, can’t hide the bulge. Then there’s that
GQ
habit of carelessly flinging a long, dark scarf over his sports coats or jean jackets.

“I’ll wait.” Bix closed the door with unnecessary force. I wondered if his patrician stomach growled in Latin, or maybe Shakespearean English. It was another mystery unsolved. At that precise second Ginger walked into the room. Most likely the growling was from Sid’s throat.

“I’ve never seen a prettier spread,” Ginger said. “Agate, you have a knack for starting with modest ingredients and making something wonderful.”

Ginger had been an annoyance in my childhood, not a thorn digging deeper and deeper into my flesh. I didn’t go for her throat. “Think of it as the loaves and the fishes,” I said.

She frowned, or close enough to make her point. “I didn’t see any fish. There is a lot of bread, though. Cheap and filling. Always a good choice on a budget.”