Janet LaPierre

A Short Story by Janet LaPierre

David Griffith was eating the meals she sent up, but he was not sending down any compliments to the cook nor, alas, asking to meet her. The quality for which Patience was named had worn very thin by mid-afternoon Tuesday when the house was finally empty except for David himself and Penny, who had settled herself in the kitchen-wing office with a pot of tea, a tape player, and the announced intention of working on household accounts. This arrangement wouldn't permit Patience to creep upstairs to see the old man, but she could have a quick run at Jack Androvich's study in the south wing.

The manuscript box on the desk contained one hundred pages of a manuscript entitled "Novel." Patience passed that by and turned to the computer. "Word" indeed, and praise be, not the newest version. On the "Word:documents" folder of the hard drive she cued "find file" and saw the "Novel" chapter files, none of which had been edited since the previous July. Jack was not making much progress with his great work.

She got up and moved to the door, to listen: no sounds of movement, Penny's Bruce Springsteen tape still playing.

A file listing by date showed Patience what Jack had written most recently: verse, short pieces with titles like "To D— at Twilight," or "To a Coy G—". If the titles suggested a latter-day Marvell or Herrick, the poems themselves struck her as appropriate for lavatory walls. And amid innocuous business letters she found pungently personal missives to three different women. Was the man out of his mind, to leave this in his machine in his wife's house?

At the sound of a car, Patience quickly closed down files and system, put the chair as she'd found it. Slam of car door and she sped on sneakered feet through the hall and into the main room. Jack's voice, from the north wing, he must have come in the kitchen door; when he passed through the big room moments later she was at the window wall observing the ocean, and he didn't speak or hesitate. Whew.

After a minute or two of deep breathing she headed for the kitchen where she belonged, and surprised Penny there at the open door of the dumbwaiter. Inside lay six bottles of wine; the box Penny was holding contained two big bottles of Wild Turkey, one of brandy, one of gin.

Penny, cheeks pink, shoved the box in beside the wine and punched the button. As the load of booze moved upwards, she gave an embarrassed little smile and shrugged her shoulders. "He drinks a lot but he's a grown man and believe me, he doesn't take kindly to advice. Besides, who's to say a sad old man can't drown his sorrows?"

"Not me," said Patience.

* * *

Patience drove the truck carefully along the dark and fog-shrouded private road. "So what could I do?" she asked Verity, who had stayed tonight to help her clear the kitchen.

"Nothing. It's her problem, her father. Maybe she's doing the best she can as she sees it. Maybe she's afraid he'll kick her and her crew out if she challenges him."

Patience's breath hissed as she drew it in through clenched teeth. "But the plain fact is that a grief-stricken eighty-year-old man, arthritic and dizzy and not seeing very well, spends his days and nights all alone with a hot tub and plenty of booze. And for a breath of air he goes out on a second-story deck that drops straight down over the bluff, I went out and got a look at that."

"Will you call Daph?"

"I need to know more, Verity. If he's living the way he is because that's what he wants, I'm not sure I think anyone's entitled to interfere. Penny has a beauty-shop appointment tomorrow mid-day, and Jack is supposedly having lunch with his sister in Santa Rosa, so I plan to get upstairs to talk to that old man. Is that the road you're wondering about?" She flipped on the truck's high-beams.

Verity sat forward and peered out at the track that circled the hillside to the north. "Right. It's been driven on quite a lot, and recently. When I called Daph she told me that there was a old bootlegger's cave behind that hill, looking down on the creek. Years ago her father had it fitted up to use as a wine cellar, but then he lost interest. However, the door is solid and it has a new lock. Not, fortunately, a very expensive one."

"Oh," said Patience. They drove on in mutually thoughtful silence.

* * *

Next morning Patience pulled onto the Griffith parking apron, dug into her big shoulder bag and handed Verity a slim leather case. "Just remember," she said, "that simply having those in your possession is against the law."

"Yes, Mother." Accepting this for the general caution is was, Verity pocketed the case, got out of the truck and headed for the garden shed. Patience sighed and set off for the morgue-like kitchen, sure to be a mess from careless breakfasters. She had finessed last night's dinner in David Griffith's direction by producing a meat sauce for his spaghetti while everyone else was having pasta primavera. Tonight she planned a nice lean Swiss steak, with a chicken breast as alternative for Jack the non-red-meat-eating philanderer. It would be only sensible to trot upstairs and ask the old man whether he was satisfied with her efforts.

* * *

Balancing the tray against her hip, Patience knocked on the door. "Mr. Griffith? It's Patience Mackellar, the cook. I've brought your lunch."

"About time. Come in," said a raspy voice. She stepped inside, nudging the door shut behind her.

"Patience. Good name for a cook. Just set that on the table over there." David Griffith, wearing a blue running suit and heavy socks but no shoes, was stretched out on a chaise, his long body indenting its puffy surface. His pewter-colored hair was thick and uncombed, his face grooved and weathered around a thrusting beak of a nose; eyes like glacier-chips gleamed from under sagging lids.

The table, with two chairs, was set against the inner wall, next to a small refrigerator and wet bar where a half-full bottle of Wild Turkey stood uncapped. Above the table hung a picture frame containing four snapshots of a broad-shouldered, strong-featured woman with a mop of black hair and, in three of the shots, a grin.

"So, Patience," he said, "you bring me more of that spaghetti?"

She turned to face him. "Yes, Mr. Griffith, and a turkey sandwich."

"Next time put in some meatballs, got that?" As he spoke, he lifted his right hand from the deep upholstery beside his leg and propped a long-barreled black revolver on his thigh, muzzle pointed straight at her.

Two seconds for stern directives to her face, her mouth, her bladder. Then she shoved her hands into the pockets of her denim skirt and said, "If you pulled that on the last cook, I bet you had to give her a hefty severance check."

He frowned at her, then looked down at the revolver. "Don't be cute. It's loaded."

"I can see that. Besides, you don't look like a man who'd carry an unloaded gun."

He responded with a pleased grin, which faded after a moment as tears welled in his eyes. "Goddamn it. Goddamn stupid old fart," he muttered, and wiped his eyes with the back of his left wrist. Then he laid the gun on a table to one side of the chaise, pushed himself upright and swung his legs over the other side. He picked up a cane from the floor and began to struggle to his feet.

"Don't look at me, damn it. And don't help, I don't need help."

"Fine with me," said Patience. This was clearly a sitting room, with bathroom and bedroom beyond, hot-tub at the very rear. Here were big windows, lined floral draperies, pale berber carpeting. Thirty-some-inch television set, music system, rack of CD's and video tapes. Two easy chairs. Bookshelves, crowded.

Griffith was on his feet now, standing straight with obvious effort, one hand on his cane while the other made a smoothing pass at his hair. "You look like you enjoy food. The spaghetti was pretty good; do me a pot roast with gravy, I'll raise your salary."

"Mr. Griffith, I've been hired to cook for the household. I don't think your daughter will eat pot roast."

"She'll eat what I pay for, silly damned female..." He clamped his mouth shut and shook his head, tears filling his eyes once again.

"Mr. Griffith, if you'll come downstairs to eat with your family, the others will probably agree to a wider range of foods. One of your grandsons could help you down."

"I said I don't need help," he snapped. "Specially not from my grandsons, the two of 'em together couldn't come up with a real muscle or a matched pair of balls." He set his cane in front of him and clasped his hands on its top as he inspected her from narrowed eyes. "Okay, it's a deal, I'll come down there and sit at the head of the damned table. For dinner, anyway."

"Good."

"And maybe afterwards you could come up and relax in my Jacuzzi with a glass of wine. Good for what ails you."

She had a momentary glimpse of the pure male energy that had won him a twenty-year-old wife when he was seventy. Patience bit back a grin that would have taken her out of character and said, rather primly, "I'm sorry. I have a good friend and he would not approve."

"I bet you do. I bet he wouldn't." David Griffith's grin faded, his eyes glittered with moisture, and he moved toward the table, stumbling once but catching himself by grasping the back of the chair. "I'm tired. Go away and let me eat my lunch in peace."

She was turning to leave when the photos caught her eye again. "Are these pictures of your wife, Mr. Griffith?"

He sighed and lowered himself carefully into the chair. "Yeah. That's Angie."

"I heard about her accident; I'm very sorry. She was an attractive woman."

"Angie was a good girl. My daughter will tell you she was a slut. And for all I know she might've been, sometimes. But she was always—how is it the kids say now? She was always there for me." He turned his attention pointedly to his food.

"Enjoy your lunch, Mr. Griffith," she said quietly. "And I'll see you at dinner." On her way to the door she eyed the pistol, considered appropriating it, decided she had no right and besides, he probably had others. What she would do was tell Daph, tonight.

Downstairs again, with an ear cocked for the sound of returning cars, Patience shut herself in the kitchen office and opened the louvered bifold doors of the closet there to find a desk, an array of shelves, a small computer, and a file cabinet.

None of this looked new; probably David Griffith had used the room as household office before Penny and her family moved in. Patience gave the desk drawers and shelves a cursory going-over and then turned to the file cabinet. Unsure just what she was looking for, she figured she'd know when she found it.

* * *

"You missed lunch, Mark. I bet Mrs. Mackellar would fix you a sandwich."

Mark Leconte smiled his sweet, stoned smile. "Not hungry. Gotta go to town with Jon."

Tessa glared at Jon, who gave her a mean white grin. "Mark, the new bass player is coming at three. For the band."

"Oh, yeah? Well. Maybe..."

"Mind your own business, baby sister," said Jon.

"Mind yours, dickhead!" snapped Tessa.

"Watch your dirty mouth!" Jon lifted an arm for a backhand swing at the girl, but Mark stumbled against his brother, grasping the lifted arm to support himself.

"Oops. Sorry. Tessa, later, okay?"

Verity, watching from some distance away in the shadow of Tessa's cottage, relaxed. The skinny kid was smarter than he looked.

"Shit shit shit shit!" Tessa stood with fists on hips and watched the two move off, Jon talking fast and Mark just shambling along. After a moment she spotted Verity and said, with a shrug, "Sorry. Every family has its rat, right?"

"It's a rule," said Verity.

Tessa gave a snort of grim laughter and looked at her watch. "Oh, well. See you later."

The Jetta was moving out smartly with Jon at the wheel. And Tessa had a class at two. When girl and Jeep left half an hour later, Verity put her tools away and set off at a good pace for her mid-day run. Past the wine-cellar trail, where nothing seemed to be happening, on to the highway and then back, and from this side she could see that no vehicle was parked on the other side of the hill.

She wasn't very experienced with the picklocks, so it took her several minutes but the lock finally yielded. A deep breath, and another, for a clear head; then she pulled the door open and slid quickly inside, closing it behind her.

The odor that enveloped her was not the rotting-flesh stench she'd anticipated and feared, but something both dark and green, thick with humidity, fecundity. Raised planter boxes marched back in orderly fashion, each under its own bank of lights, each with its own drip-irrigation arrangement; the leafy plants reaching for the lights were not yet large, but seemed to be growing as she watched. These were not tomatoes.

"The little bastards," she said softly. She had no idea of the market value of this much potential bud, clearly not a crop just for personal use. No current notion, either, of the penalties risked, except that they were painful.

The side walls sloped down into darkness and a thicket of cords and hoses. At the rear of the room, also dark, old wine racks were stacked with bags of soil and fertilizer. Verity's penlight found spider webs, tools for gardening and other purposes, empty bags, extra or discarded hoses and wire and light tubes.

When the sound of an engine penetrated the earth-insulated building, she swore softly and turned the light on her watch: only 2:15. Maybe just a generator kicking in? she thought, looking frantically for a rear exit and finding only a too-narrow vent pipe. When the slamming of car doors squashed that faint hope, she dived behind the loaded racks and buried herself among debris and bags of manure.

* * *

David Griffith came down the stairs on his own, one hand clutching the railing, the other gripping his cane. When he reached the bottom, he pulled a bottle of red wine from the pocket of his tweed jacket. "Smelled meat," he said. "When do we eat?"

"Daddy!" Penny rushed to offer him an arm, but he waved her away. Patience moved to the head of the table and pulled out the chair there; Griffith hobbled over, seated himself, and surveyed his family, lined up as if for presentation.

"Sit down for Chrissakes."

Everyone was here, Tessa in a long cotton skirt and the boys slicked up a bit although Mark kept his head down in an effort to hide a blackening eye. Penny wore navy wool trousers and a pink sweater, Jack cords and a sports shirt. Paying close attention to this edgy tableau as she brought dishes of food to the table, Patience had a niggling worry in the back of her mind: she had not seen Verity since lunchtime.

Unless she'd come in while Patience was upstairs with David, Verity had not phoned Harley for a ride. The truck was still parked where they'd left it this morning. Once the last serving dish was on, she slipped out for a look around; the fog was in and thickening, Verity nowhere in sight, the door to the garden shed ajar. No one in there but three cats.

Patience went back inside to her job—or jobs. Through the glass panel high in the swinging kitchen door, she could see the dining table. David Griffith sat in his armed chair like a potentate. Penny looked small and flustered, Jack seemed to be grinding his teeth. Mark cowered, Jon sulked; only Tessa was enjoying herself, talking brightly to her grandfather about something Patience couldn't hear.

Patience was dishing up dessert—pound cake and sliced early strawberries—when the outside kitchen door opened and a filthy, grim-faced Verity slipped inside.

"What happened?" breathed Patience. Remembering Mark's black eye, she reached for the overhead rack and pulled the big chef's knife free.

"Go easy, Ma." Verity spoke very softly and managed a smile. "I'm not hurt."

Patience took a deep breath, laid the knife aside, and went back to spooning strawberries over cake. "Tell me."

"I got in without much trouble, but they caught me there. Tied me up and locked me in, but I convinced them somebody'd left the door unlocked, and they didn't find my picklocks. No dead bodies there, okay? But let me tell you what the "boys" have been up to."

* * *

After serving dessert and coffee, Patience moved to David Griffith's side and said, quietly, "Mr. Griffith, my daughter has some information for you."

Griffith looked at Patience, looked past her as Verity came into the room, stiffened and stared. "What the hell happened to you, young woman?"

Jon's coffee cup shattered as he dropped it, and Mark moaned, "Oh, shit!"

"I found the marijuana plantation your grandsons have working in your wine cellar. So they tied me up and locked me in."

"Marijuana... dope growing on my property, by God? Stay where you are, you sneaky little sons of bitches!" A blow from his fist set dishes rattling. "If this is the truth... sure it is, I can tell by your faces, and I'm gonna have your hides for it!"

"Daddy!" wailed Penny.

"Shut up, Penelope. Jon, Mark. On your feet, you pissant bastards. Tessa?"

As the girl stared at him wide-eyed, Mark moved to stand behind her chair. "No sir. She wasn't involved. Just me and Jon."

"And do you—all of you!" he snarled—"understand that if the cops and the feds find out about your goddam dope factory, they will send you little pricks to jail for the rest of your natural lives and confiscate this place and probably any other assets of mine that happen to catch their attention?"

Patience watched, content to let the old man work this through; perhaps he'd even get to the other piece, the connection she'd found in the file cabinet.

Penny was wailing and dripping tears over prayerfully clenched hands. Jack looked distant: nothing to do with me. Tessa pressed a hand over her mouth and looked as if she might be biting her own fingers.

"And what about this girl here? What did you two geniuses have in mind for her? Maybe..." Patience saw the thought hit him like a fist.

"Or maybe. Or maybe," he said softly, and looked at his two grandsons, Mark standing straight and Jon slouched with hands in pockets. "Maybe you've already got that worked out, eh? Maybe it's a plan you used before, when my Angie came across your little victory garden?"

"Oh, no!" said Mark, voice catching in his throat.

"No way!" said Jon, "Absolutely not! Look, maybe I talked rough about Angie, sir, but I really respected her. Even if she had found out—and she didn't—I honest to God wouldn't have done her any harm. We wouldn't."

"Of course you wouldn't." Penny got up from her chair and scuttled around the table to stand beside Jon. "Daddy, of course they wouldn't."

"You're not being smart, Penny. Never were very smart," Griffith said sadly. He slid his right hand into his jacket pocket and pulled out the big revolver. As Penny shrieked, he propped both elbows on the table and took a two-handed grip on the gun. "Who's first?" he asked, thumbing back the hammer.

Tessa thrust herself up from her chair, to stand in front of Mark. Jon stood where he was, a dark stain spreading down the leg of his gray trousers.

Patience remembered her chance at the gun, chalked it up as a bad decision, and hoped the old man carried an empty chamber under the hammer.

Penny clasped her hands before her and gave a ghastly, girlish smile. "Daddy, they didn't do it. Truly they didn't. I did it, and I'm really sorry, but... I had to take care of my family, didn't I?

"I found a copy of the prenuptial agreement that was supposed to protect us, and it had a ten-year limit. And you weren't renewing it, your attorney's secretary is a friend and she told me. Everything would be community property. Or worse. And then what about us?"

David Griffith lifted the revolver and sighted along its barrel. Penny, still smiling, reached for Jon's arm, but he moved aside and she nearly fell.

"Mr. Griffith, don't." Patience took a step toward the table as she spoke; from the corner of her eye she saw Verity moving to circle behind David's seat, her feet silent on the carpet.

"What, you're going to tell me it won't bring Angie back? Just shut up."

"I wouldn't tell you anything so obvious. But I can promise that shooting your daughter won't make you feel better."

David Griffith sighed, lowered the gun and laid it on the table next to his plate. He turned his head to look up at Verity, right behind him now. "Take it. Christ, you're a big one; no wonder my wimpy grandsons couldn't stop you.

"Somebody shut her up," he added as Penny sank to her knees and began to sob. "Tessa, deal with your mother."

"Mr. Griffith," said Patience, "Your older daughter, Daphne, is a friend of mine. Would you like me to call her for you?"

"Daphne. Hell yes, why not? She's a better man than anybody here. Including me." Griffith gripped the table edge, looked around the room, and pointed a shaking finger.

"You! Mark!"

"Yessir."

"You and your brother and... and you, too, Androvich. The three of you get out there and clean out that wine cellar, got me? Remove all traces!"

As the three of them moved, Griffith looked at Patience. "You got any trouble with that?"

"With what?"

* * *

A short time later Patience and Verity trooped in not quite companionable silence to their truck.

"Want me to drive?" asked Verity.

"Yes, if you don't mind. I feel old and tired. Did those rotten boys hurt you much?"

"No worse than I'd get in a fast basketball game. And I pounded Jon where it counts," said Verity with satisfaction. "I really hate it that they're being let off with no... okay, okay, that's a stupid law. But I'd like them to suffer."

"I think they will." Patience leaned her head back and closed her eyes.

"I suppose. And so will Penny, one way or another."

"True."

"Hey, Mom? You know what those guys are saying right now?"

"I have no idea."

"They're looking at each other and going, 'Hey, who the hell were those masked women?'"

Without opening her eyes, Patience giggled.