The Crossword Connection (3 page)

BOOK: The Crossword Connection
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“They're not gonna make us move, are they?” Rayanne's tone had dropped to a fierce whisper.

“Over my dead body,” was Sister Mary Catherine's angry reply. Then her weathered face broke into a smile of genuine warmth. “How's the almost bride?”

“Eight days left.” Belle tried to match the nun's determinedly jovial demeanor. She glanced at her watch. “Eight days, seven hours, and fifty-two minutes until Annabella Graham weds one Rosco Polycrates. But who's counting? … Oh, geez, I didn't realize it was so late. I told Rosco's sister Cleo I'd stop by and look at her kitchen renovation; then he and I are getting the all-important license.… I've got to go, Ray. See you Monday.”

“Brains and brawn,” Rayanne replied.

“It's not either/or, Ray. You've got to give yourself credit.”

“Fight. Right,” Ray said.

Driving to Rosco's sister's suburban home, Belle was subjected to the usual conflicting emotions she experienced after leaving the shelter. There was no doubt that the two nuns who ran the mission were remarkable people. There was also no doubt that many of the residents had wonderful and untapped gifts and that enthusiastic support was all they needed to get their lives back on track: finish educations, find and keep jobs, discover self-worth.

The problem lay in the fact that for each woman who successfully passed through and out of the system, another appeared at the door. How Sister Mary Catherine and Sister Zoe lived with this dilemma while maintaining a sanguine outlook was something Belle didn't understand, especially now that they were facing so much pressure from the city's business interests. An ordinance declaring residential shelters illegal in the area wasn't out of the realm of possibility.

Pondering these myriad problems, Belle turned her car into Cleo's drive, swerved to avoid a jumble of neighborhood children's bikes, parked, walked up to the entry, sidestepping a baseball bat, a soccer ball, a pint-sized football helmet, and two water pistols as large and black as military rifles.

She rang the doorbell and was greeted by the sound of dogs barking, kids bounding up and down the stairs, the whine of a masonry saw, and the rhythmic pounding of a hammer. Belle knocked, waited, then opened the door and edged into the living room. “Cleo? Hello? It's me, Belle.”

A year-old basset hound running sideways while hoisting a two-foot-long rawhide bone almost bowled her over. “Cleo?” Belle called again.

A five-year-old girl in pink ballerina regalia glared imperiously down from the landing. “That's not Cleo,” she announced while scrutinizing the guest and adopting a pose that resembled a lilliputian Elizabeth Regina. “I know you. You're Uncle Rosco's fiancée.” The word was pronounced
fancy
and contained all the iciness a five-year-old can project when dealing with a beloved uncle's future bride.

“Hi, Effie.” Belle pasted on what she hoped was an engaging smile while another, larger dog careened around the corner followed by the girl's older brother. He, in turn, was pursued by three additional eight-year-olds armed to the teeth with purple and silver intergalactic-style guns that shot rays of red light while emitting teeth-tingling squeals. “Where's Mom?” the ballerina shouted. “Uncle Rosco's
fancy's
here.”

“Mom!” the boy bellowed as he and his friends pelted out the door Belle had left ajar.

“I like your costume, Effie,” Belle said, but her miniature nemesis only increased her scowl. Uncle Rosco had always been Effie's favorite; his
fancy
was an interloper of the highest order. “It's not a costume; it's an
outfit.
That's what Mommy calls it.” Then Effie vanished up the stairs.

Belle took a breath and walked the length of the living room. “Cleo? Hello?”

The masonry saw stopped whining. “She's out in the garage arguing with Geoffrey about the color of the cabinets.” Sharon poked her head through the interior window that joined the upper kitchen and family area to the lower living room. “Cleo says it's too red or something, but Geoff is sticking to his guns. I guess we're into homeowner meltdown.” Sharon grinned with her Vermonter's fleeting sense of joy. A well-padded six foot one with arms and hands that could easily handle the stone and marble that earned her her daily bread, she had a big face; and her dark hair was cropped so short it bristled over her broad and unperturbed brow. Sharon reminded Belle of a friendly giant peering down from the window. “What's up?”

“I just stopped by to see how things were progressing—”

Sharon's head disappeared. Belle heard slabs of marble being repositioned while a voice boomed above the noise. “Not to worry. We'll get it done in time, Belle. You got bride jitters, is all. I've worked with Geoff long enough to know he always delivers.”

Alone in the living room, Belle's “I'm not nervous in the least,” was drowned by another screech of the masonry saw. White marble powder billowed through the open window. She walked outside, clutched her jacket against the morning chill, and entered the garage.

“Cherry
is what I wanted, Geoffrey. That looks like
magenta.”
The word was elongated into an operatic sigh; the eldest of the Polycrates siblings, Cleo had always had the temperament of a Greek diva. She turned around as her future sister-in-law entered.
“Belle. Honeybunch.
Come give me
your
opinion. Doesn't this color seem overly pink? I mean, an entire
wall
of this shade …?” She let the words trail off as she and Geoff Wright returned their concentration to the cabinetry in question. The entire garage was filled with similar cuts of wood in various stages of completion.

“I want
authenticity,”
Cleo insisted. “I don't want
plasticized
American
kitsch.
That's why I hired you. You're an
artist.
Everyone told me you were the
best
.… Went to that fancy
design
school in Rhode Island and everything … I want the kitchen cabinets
hand-crafted,
and I want them to
look
hand-crafted.”

Belle studied the doors and drawers strewn about the garage. Eight days until the wedding, eight days before forty or fifty guests were to descend upon Cleo's house for a postnuptial party, and the “new” kitchen was still inoperable.
Forget the platters of homemade goodies,
Belle told herself,
we'll be lucky if there's enough space for take-out pizza boxes.

“It's cherry, Cleo,” Geoffrey insisted. “Just like you asked me for.… Now, I could apply more burnt umber if you'd like, but you didn't want too much brown, remember?”

Cleo sighed pointedly.

“Let me try additional umber.… I think you'll like it.” Geoff winked at Belle as if he'd just noticed her standing there and added a cheery “Hiya, Tinker Bell. You've done something new with your hair.”

Belle stifled a wince. Why is it, she wondered, that certain people attract the most hideous nicknames? Born Annabella Graham, she'd been dubbed “A. Graham Belle” by waggish high-school classmates, then “AnnaGram” because of her career as an editor of crossword puzzles. Now Geoffrey Wright, wisecracking cabinetmaker, Ivy League graduate and enthusiastic resident of the Northern provinces had decided on “Tinker Bell,” which Cleo, Cleo's sister Ariadne, and their respective husbands and children found excruciatingly funny. The only member of the extended Polycrates clan who didn't crack a smile was the family matriarch, Helen.

“I thought I'd try a new style for the wedding.” Belle patted her lacquered and upswept blond hair with inexperienced hands. “With only
a week to go,
I didn't want to wait and leave experiments for the day before.”

The hint about timing eluded the combatants. Cleo's focus remained on the cabinet door while Geoff affixed Belle with another bright grin. “If you're taking a poll, I like it better the way you always wear it. Don't mess it up with goo and shellac. Be ‘authentic' like her highness says.”

“If you're
certain
I won't
regret
this decision, Geoffrey …” Cleo's tone had turned simpering.

“White Barre marble and cherry wood. You can't get more New England, Cleo.”

“See you both later,” Belle said, although no one responded.

She walked back into the May sunlight and her blessedly empty car. After driving several blocks through the suburban subdivision, she turned into a side street and switched off the ignition.
Rosco warned me,
she told herself;
it's a big family
…
and a Greek family. There are uncles and aunts, nieces and nephews, and each of those people has many friends, colleagues, neighbors, enemies, and rivals. What does an only child raised by two absent-minded Anglophile professors know about communal living?

She stared through the windshield. The clouds were rapidly darkening and the wind beginning to gust. All the same, a group of robins bounced among the branches of a nearby apple tree, their breasts fat and red against the burgeoning greenery. If she rolled down the window or released the door handle, Belle knew she would hear them calling boldly to one another. Open: the noise of life. Closed: the silence of solitude.
Open and shut,
she thought.
Life should be so easy. Or as Rayanne might put it: Open, hopin', copin'.

CHAPTER 4

The Marriage License Bureau lay within the City Hall complex fronting Winthrop Drive. The tall central building had been constructed of granite, now aged to a rough gray white by one hundred fifty years of Massachusetts winters. Doric columns surmounted spacious steps that led from street level to the showy entry. It was a place that exuded power, responsibility, the wisdom of long-dead town fathers, and the austerity of their verdicts. As she circled the building looking for a parking place, Belle glanced up at the frieze carved within the pediment: sailing ships tossed on a turbulent sea. Newcastle had once been a whaling city; the ocean had made her rich; benign or perilous weather was another form of judgment.

She circled City Hall three times, finally snagging a parking spot on Third Street, and glanced at her watch. “Oh, geez … late again.” Belle sighed. Why was it, she wondered, that she had such difficulty maintaining a schedule? Was it genetic, like her inability to gauge north from south and east from west, or tell a joke without garbling the punch line?

She locked her car, hurried down Winthrop Drive, pelted up the exterior granite steps, and dashed toward the interior marble stairway. On the third floor, the central rotunda revealed a series of narrow corridors that glimmered uneasily with fluorescent light.
Marriage Licenses,
Belle read. She rounded the corner and ran.

“Rosco! Hi! Sorry! I was working with Rayanne, and then I stopped in at Cleo's.…” Breathless, she beamed at him. The world, all at once, seemed reliable and good. An open-and-shut case, she realized. Her smile grew; her gray eyes danced. “Geoff, the miracle man, is fussing with wood stains. Cleo is, well, you know …” She shook her head; a pin holding her carefully sculpted locks dropped onto the floor. “Oops! Maybe the fifties glamour-girl look is out.”

“I love you the way you look every day … any day.” Rosco grinned and moved closer, but the proximity of several nervous couples and a termagant clerk made him keep a decorous distance. “How were things at Sister Mary Catherine's?”

Belle's eyes suddenly narrowed. “I'm afraid there's a property battle brewing.”

Rosco shook his head but didn't speak.

“Can't those people be left in peace, Rosco? If anyone's responsible for cleaning up that section of town, it's the nuns and Father Tom. And now their hard work is being thrown in their faces … rumors that the shelters are attracting addicts and criminals; it's stupid. They're the ones who pushed out the druggies in the first place.”

“Anywhere but my backyard … That's progress for you,” Rosco muttered.

“Progress, my eye. It's plain, old-fashioned greed!”

Belle's vehement righteousness brought another smile to Rosco's face. “And how was the rest of your morning? Everything in the burbs okay?”

Belle let out a worried sigh. “The kitchen's never going to be finished in time.” She paused, searching for a tactful approach. “Do you think Cleo would mind terribly if we moved the party? My house might be able to accommodate—”

“Yes, I
do
think Cleo would mind. Forget
think;
I
know
she'd mind. She wants to welcome you into the family.” Rosco watched Belle's mouth grow thin and tight. “She's my sister. She and Ariadne; my brother, Danny; my mom …” Rosco counted the four of them off on his fingers. “But they're not me, Belle. We don't have to spend more time with the Polycrates clan than you're comfortable with.”

“What about your ‘Third Tuesday Family Shoot-Outs'?”

“And we don't have to go to that every month, either. Besides, you said you enjoyed them.”

Bewilderment creased Belle's brow. “I did! I do! It's just that—”

“We're not going to be swallowed whole. We'll have our own life, I promise.”

Belle stared at the floor. “You wore socks!” she said with a sudden grin.

“Yeah … well … in honor of the big occasion.”

“You don't have to change, Rosco. Just because we're getting married.”

“There. See? You don't change, I don't change, and everyone lives happily ever after.”

The clerk looked like a stick figure drawn in pencil; her skin, hair, even the clothes that covered her slight frame were colorless and flat. She even had a tentative way of moving, darting her fingers across the government forms, weighing official stamps and ballpoint pens as if she were about to drop them and run for the hills while her smile—such as it was—looked as if it had been added as an afterthought by someone unaware that lips should curve upward in pleasure. When the woman spoke, however, she was transformed. The clerk had the voice of a tiger. “Name?”

BOOK: The Crossword Connection
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