Killer Pancake Part 9

And work in the kitchen I did. The second batch of ribs needed to be precooked and cooled, then chilled overnight before being reheated at the fair the next morning. I lifted the thick, meaty slabs and arranged them on racks in the oven. Soon the rich scent of roasting pork wafted through the house, and I went upstairs and opened the windows for air. Poor little Colin Routt started wailing when a motorcycle roared by. Within moments, though, someone started playing the jazz saxophone, and the baby quieted. I wished we could all have our jangled nerves calmed so easily.

I glanced up and down the street, looking for the pickup truck that had been blocking our driveway the evening before. The pickups along the curb all looked alike. I found this to be true even when they were zooming past me down the highway. In Colorado, the only difference I could distinguish between moving pickup trucks was how many dogs were trying to keep their balance in the back of each one.

Arch trudged home at nine and headed straight for bed. At one A.M. I set the alarm for six and fell between the sheets. Poor Tom, I thought as I drifted off. Such a long workday. A sudden blast of noise brought me to full consciousness. I sprang out of bed and irrationally checked the closet. Tom's bulletproof vest was still there. I crossed to the window. A flash of lightning and rumble of thunder heralded another nighttime storm. That would account for the noise. I fell back into bed and wondered how long it would take to get used to being married to a policeman.

I listened to rain pelt the roof and wished I could fall asleep. Tom came in later, finally, and nestled comfortably beside me. The nights are too short, I was foggily aware of thinking as sleep finally claimed me. And the days are too long.

I awoke in a sudden sweat. The bedroom was flooded with light. The radio alarm had not blared some forgettably peppy tune, because the doggone power was out again. This time Tom had departed without my realizing it. His terse note on the mirror read: No news on investigation. We're checking Hotchkiss. I called SW hospital. Glad Marla's recovering. T. I wondered if he'd had a nice chat with Dr. Lyle Gordon.

I b.u.t.toned myself into my chef's jacket, zipped up a black skirt, and checked on a still-sleeping Arch. After a frantic search I located my watch and dully realized that I had less than forty minutes to put together the ribs and other goodies for the food fair. If I was not set up down at the mall by nine-forty, I would miss the county health inspector's visit to my booth and risk being expelled from the whole event And then what would I do with three hundred individual portions of ribs, salad, bread, and cookies? Not something I wanted to think about.

On so little sleep, facing such hurried preparation without the ability to brew a caffeinated drink was truly the punishment of the d.a.m.ned. When I scurried into the kitchen, Julian was chopping fervently for the Chamber of Commerce brunch. Neat piles of raisins, grated gingerroot, and plump slices of nectarine indicated he was starting with the chutney. His hair was wet from his shower and he was wearing pristine black pants, a white shirt, and a freshly bleached and ironed ap.r.o.n. But his happy expression of two mornings before was gone. Grieving took different forms, and I trusted Julian to tell us if he needed help. On the other hand, the kid could be as stubborn as a mountain goat.

"I don't know how I'm supposed to cook without power," he announced ferociously as he whacked the spice cabinet open. "I called Public Service, and they said it would be at least an hour before electricity was restored. What is the matter with these people?"

His anger dissolved my resolution not to pry. "Tell me how you're doing," I said.

He faced me, clenching two gla.s.s spice jars. His skin was gray, his eyes bloodshot. He had cut himself shaving and a corner of tissue stuck to his cheekbone. "How do you think I'm doing?"

I said nothing.

He turned away. "I'm sorry. I know you care. I just ... don't want to talk about what happened day before yesterday." He measured out cinnamon and added in a low voice, "I'm not ready."

"Look, Julian, I don't know if it's such a good idea for you to be doing this brunch today. Why don't you let me call somebody in to help? Maybe one of your cla.s.smates from Elk Park Prep could come over. It's just not that big a deal to get a temporary server."

"No, no," he said angrily as he measured ground cloves. "I've got the whole day mapped out. All I need is some f.u.c.king electricity."

"It'll come back on just when I'm leaving," I told him as I opened the refrigerator. "It's called Murphy's Law of Food Preparation."

"Huh?"

"Oh, nothing." I got out the covered containers of ribs, salad, bread, and cookies. The walk-in refrigerator would stay cold for several hours if the door was not opened too often. Lucky for me the organizers of the fair were providing butane burners and grills for heating food. I couldn't imagine serving-much less eating-cold barbecued ribs at ten o'clock in the morning.

Julian set aside the spices and began to dice the onion. "Coronary Care Unit visiting hours are the first ten minutes of every hour," he continued in a clipped, controlled tone. "I'm going down when I finish the chamber shindig. Is the hospital staff going to give me a hard time? Should I tell them she's my aunt Marla? That sounds kind of funny, I've never called her that before. I mean, really, I've been on my own for quite a while."

"As long as you're there the first ten minutes, you'll be fine. I was there yesterday, and the receptionist guarding the doors to the CCU was like a female Doberman. But Marla's doctor's pretty nice, although she treats him terribly." Julian shook his head morosely. I continued. "The doc wants her to have as much emotional support from visitors as she can get. Why don't you come get me at the mall? My time at the food fair will be up by then, and we can go see her together."

He set aside the onion and washed his hands. "Okay. I have the chamber brunch, then cleanup, then drive down and pick you up at the food fair, then go see Marla. Does that sound okay? I wanted to take Arch with me, but he said he promised Todd they could go to a record swap this afternoon. The thunder woke us up last night, so we talked about his plans." His words were still coming out fast, much faster than usual. "Arch wanted to help me today too. But I said no. I asked him if I could help him find some sixties alb.u.ms." Julian took a breath and poured sugar into a measuring cup. It cascaded over the top and he cursed softly. "I mean, I've been promising him all summer that I'd help him with his new hobby and I haven't done any of it. Plus I was going to take him to some veterinarian's office yesterday." He reached for the cider vinegar and measured it carefully. "Now I'll have lots of time. I guess. We can go to the animal hospital. I don't know much about sixties music, though, like Jimi Hendrix-" He broke off, slammed the bottle of vinegar on the counter, and clasped his arms around his shivering body.

"Julian, don't-" I put my arms around him. I couldn't bear to see someone so young in such pain. I murmured to him how sorry I was, that the whole situation was awful, to go ahead and cry all he wanted, that he should forget the d.a.m.n chamber brunch. I'd order everything in from the Chinese place.

"If I just knew why," he sobbed into my shoulder. "If I just knew who would do this! G.o.d! What is the matter with the world?"

"I know. It's screwed up."

"I feel as if-" He choked on his words, then said, "Life is so stupid. It is just dumb, that's all. When something like this can happen and people just go on ... Oh, what's the point?"

Again I replied that I didn't know. My heart felt painfully heavy. Would he please take a day off, I begged. But Julian merely shook his head, and said he was doing the brunch. Just could I stop talking about it, he asked me. He looked disconsolately around the kitchen and then began to arrange frozen rolls on a rack to thaw.

The phone rang. A woman from the church was volunteering to contact an excellent private nurse for Marla. I thanked her and said that would be wonderful. Would I be at the early service this Sunday to tell the parish how Marla was doing, she asked. I replied that I would.

When I hung up, I touched Julian's arm. "Will you call Tom today and check in occasionally? Please? I won't be near a phone, and I'm going to be a wreck worrying about you-"

"Sure, of course." He managed a mirthless smile. "When we were talking during the storm, Arch told me-real serious, you know how he is-that he was going to stick to me like epoxy all morning while I was cooking. He swore he'd call an ambulance if I went into shock." Julian chuckled morbidly. I sighed. "So I told him to concentrate on the Mothers of Invention and I'd worry about the fathers of commerce. Tell you what, Goldy. I didn't want to mention that even if he finds some of those old LPs, he's never going to get hold of a system that'll play them."

"Who's fighting?" demanded a sleepy Arch. He stood in the doorway of the kitchen. "I heard you guys."

"n.o.body," I a.s.sured him. This morning, my son was wearing an oversize black T-shirt that said GO PANTHERS! on it. Looking for memorabilia from the civil rights movement, Arch had been overjoyed to find the tattered thing at the Aspen Meadow secondhand store. I hadn't had the heart to tell him it was the booster uniform from the Idaho Springs High School football team.

He pushed his gla.s.ses up his nose. His straw-brown hair stuck out in all directions, like a game of pick-up sticks. "Don't you need to leave, Mom?"

"Yes, yes." But I didn't move.

Arch turned to Julian and frowned. "Okay, here I am. Why don't you give me something to chop for the brunch you're doing?"

Julian said, "Why don't you sit down and have breakfast, Eldridge, and then I will."

Arch plopped into a kitchen chair, caught my eye, and gave me a nodding scowl: Everything's going to be okay here, his look said. Sometimes our clan felt like a pride of lions, everyone protective of everyone else. I scooped up the first chafing dish and walked outside.

With all their more harmful consequences, at least the storms had brought a welcome break in the weather. A breeze ruffled my chef's jacket. I hustled past Tom's garden. Cabbage b.u.t.terflies and iridescent hummingbirds flitted from red dianthus to purple Corsican violet. Aspen leaves that had stirred so languidly on their pale branches two days before now quivered, as if in antic.i.p.ation of a change in season. In Aspen Meadow, fall usually begins in the middle of August, which was just six weeks away. In the distance, patches of brilliant sunlight on breeze-rippled Aspen Meadow Lake quilted the water with sparkles.

When I came back in, Arch was eating one of the cranberry-orange m.u.f.fins Julian had made on Wednesday. I packed the food and the second chafer into the van. Julian insisted on hauling out the dry ice and the speed cart, where the cups of salad would stay cold. At the last moment I remembered the bleach water. The vat of bleach water is a necessary hygiene element for utensils when no running water is available. I packed the closed chlorine-smelling vat in last. With a coffee-deprivation headache percolating, I fervently hoped that one of the food fair booths would offer espresso, and plenty of it.

The van choked, coughed, and wheezed before moving unenthusiastically out of the driveway. An inch-thick spew of stones and gravel covered our road and Main Street. When I exited Interstate 70 and moved into the heavy stream of summer-in-the-suburbs traffic, my temperature gauge flickered upward ominously. The first surge of Denver's hot air filled the van, and I thought of Julian, with us for a year, part of the family. After his outburst in the kitchen, he had warned me brusquely to have something to eat before I started working. He'd said, You don't want to faint in that heat. I took a bite of one of the m.u.f.fins he had placed on a napkin in the pa.s.senger seat. The tart cranberries and Grand Marnier combined for a heady taste. I remembered how energetically Julian had banged the tin into the oven before Claire arrived. And then his agonized questions from this morning echoed in my ear: Who would do this? Why ...

I put on the turn signal to go back to Aspen Meadow. Turned it off. Turned it back on. Leave him alone, my inner voice warned. If you do the chamber brunch, you'll only be saying you think he's incompetent. Reluctantly, I turned off the ticker and resolved to stick with the day's plan. After all, the mall opened at eight for special sales in all the stores, and folks were going to come up to the food fair famished from shopping. At least, that was my hope.

"Hey, lady! Make up your mind! The light's gonna change!" came a shout from a convertible behind me.

When the light turned, I gritted my teeth and urged the van forward. I decided to concentrate on the morning ahead. But I had never done a food fair before, and the idea filled me with unhappy antic.i.p.ation.

Booths at A Taste of Furman County were much sought after, although it was hard to figure out why. Great publicity, I guessed. The big beneficiary of the event was Playhouse Southwest. For the hundreds of servings the playhouse auxiliary told the food folks to provide each day, none of us was compensated. Visitors to the fair, though, paid forty bucks a pop to obtain the official bracelets that allowed them into the tent-festooned roof of the mall garage. The open air was necessary for ventilation, and the roof provided views of Denver's suburban sprawl to the east and the Front Range of the Rockies to the west Once inside the roped-off area, tasters were promised that horror of horrors, all you can eat, which to food people translates as until we run out. There had been so much demand for booths from local restaurateurs, chef's, and caterers who wanted to offer their wares, the organizers had even split up the serving times into two-hour shifts. I did not know whether potential clients would be likely to shop or eat during my daily slot from ten to noon. I certainly hoped that they'd stop by my booth, be enthralled and enchanted, and whip out their calendars-and checkbooks-to sign me up for all kinds of profitable new bookings. Otherwise, I was going to be very upset. Not to mention out about a thousand bucks' worth of supplies.

My van sputtered and slowed behind a line of traffic crawling toward the mall garage entrance. After a moment I saw what was once again causing the slowdown. At the side of the parking lot, by the elegant marble entrance to Prince & Grogan, a crowd of animal rights' demonstrators waved placards that read MIGNON COSMETICS BRING DEATH-DEATH TO MIGNON COSMETICS! Shaman Krill, arms outstretched, hair wild, was leading the crowd in a chant that I couldn't quite make out. The row of cars stopped. I reached across and gingerly rolled down the pa.s.senger-side window.

"Death on your hands! Death on your face!"

A uniformed officer was directing traffic. The van crept forward. As I neared the shouting demonstrators, my hands became clammy on the steering wheel. Three parked sheriff's department vehicles seemed to indicate that the police weren't just there to head cars up the ramps.

"Death isn't pretty! Death's pretty gritty!"

Maybe there were other cops I couldn't see who were keeping an eye on the activists. Or perhaps the officers were there as part of the continuing investigation into Claire's murder. From the small crowd of people pushing through the nearby door to Foley's department store, it looked as if shoppers were avoiding the protest. This, undoubtedly, was the deterrent the demonstrators wanted, since Mignon was carried exclusively by Prince & Grogan.

"Food fair or shopping?" the policeman asked when my van was finally first in line.

"Food fair."

He pointed to the far right side of the ramp, where a food service truck was lumbering up to the top level. When I slowly accelerated away from the cop, there was a thud on the side of the van, and then another. Frantically scanning the mirrors, I thought I must have been hit by a car backing up, when Shaman Krill's face leered at the partly open pa.s.senger-side window.

"Hey! Caterer! Going to throw any more food around today? What're you serving, slaughtered cow?"

I leaned on the horn with one hand and rolled down the driver-side window with the other.

"Help!" I yelled. "Help, help!"

The policeman hustled over. By the time I could tell him one of the demonstrators had hara.s.sed me, Shaman Krill had disappeared. Even when I stopped the van and hopped out to look where he'd gone, I couldn't see the activist's dark, bobbing head in the crowd. The policeman asked if I wanted to file a report. I said no. I quickly told him that Investigator Tom Schulz was my husband, and that I'd tell him all about it, but that at the moment I was late to set up for the food fair. The officer reluctantly let me go, with the admonition to be careful.

I climbed back in the driver's seat and pressed firmly on the accelerator. The van whizzed up the ramp of the parking garage. Yellow police ribbons around the place where Claire died came into view. I averted my eyes.

I pulled into a parking s.p.a.ce, pinned on my official Food-Fair Server badge, and glanced at my watch. Eight-thirty. A little over an hour remained to get everything set up on the roof before the inspector showed up with his trusty little thermometer to see if my hot food was hot enough and my cold food sufficiently chilly. The diagram of food fair booths showed my booth was next to the stairway up from the second-floor garage entrance to Prince & Grogan. A stream of weight-wielding walkers impeded my schlepping the first load of boxes to the elevator, but I finally made it. Within thirty minutes I had wheeled, carted, and hauled my stuff into place. I put out my ads with sample menus and price lists, fired up the butane burner, and waited for the grills to heat. And then, oh, then, I thanked the patron saints of cappuccino that right across from the spot allocated to Goldilocks' Catering was a booth with the sign PETE'S ESPREs...o...b..R.

I slapped the first batch of ribs on the grill and dashed across the makeshift aisle to the deliciously appetizing smell. With more success than I would have thought possible, Pete had been running a coffee place at Westside Mall since the shopping center had been refurbished. He'd taken it upon himself to run a wonderfully inventive promotional campaign, including taking nighttime orders for hot coffee drinks delivered first thing in the morning to nearby businesses. He called it Federal Espresso. Today, Pete, a thirtyish, dark-haired fellow who had managed both to transport and get a power source for an enormous steam-driven Rancilio machine, was wearing a T-shirt that said NEED COFFEE DELIVERED? USE ESPRESSO MALE. He instantly recognized the symptoms of latte-deprivation and fixed me a tall one with three shots. I sipped it gratefully while looking eastward off the garage roof. A beautiful old neighborhood called Aqua Bella was not half a mile away, and the rooftops of the large, older homes were just visible-the turrets of a pale Victorian, the chimneys of an Edwardian. It wasn't as good as looking at the lake and the mountains with my morning coffee, but it was okay.

"Gorgeous, isn't it?" said a dreamy voice. "Wouldn't you just love to live over there?" Dusty Routt sighed gustily. "Someday. When I get out of this place," she added bitterly.

"I like Aspen Meadow, actually," I replied. Dusty looked better than the day before-calmer, more in control. For which I was grateful. "Denver's too crowded," I added. "How are you doing? Better?"

"Well, I ... how's Julian?"

"Not so hot."

She sighed again. "I guess I'm doing better. I'm just getting some coffee before I go work," she said apologetically, and turned to Pete. She shook the food fair bracelet past the cuff of her dark green Mignon uniform to show him. "I'll take two chocolate-dipped biscotti to go with the latte." She picked up one of the pamphlets Pete was offering, The History and Science of Coffee. "Better make that three biscotti," she said. She wrinkled her nose and gave me the pamphlet when Pete handed across her drink and pile of cookies. While Pete tried to sell her some Sumatra Blend, I read that according to legend, coffee provided mental alertness, a cure for catarrh, an antidote for hemlock, and a lessening of the symptoms of narcolepsy. I could have used some narcolepsy last night. I tossed the pamphlet into a trash can. Dusty politely refused Pete's offer for a discount on the Sumatra, picked up her breakfast, and said in a confidential tone, "You know, Goldy, I really shouldn't be doing this food fair. I mean, forty bucks, and the mall workers don't even get a discount! But the bracelet's good all day ... maybe I'll have something nutritious during my break. I just need to get a little sugar in my system before I go out there and sell, sell, sell."

I sipped Pete's marvelous latte and glanced at the ribs. They were now sending up savory swirls of smoke. "That's okay. Julian already told me about what cosmetics folks eat."

A look of worry crossed Dusty's pretty, chubby face. "But ... did he come with you? Is he okay? They called all the reps last night to tell us about the police investigation...." She faltered. This morning, Dusty's short, orange-blond hair was coiffed in a spill of stiff waves framing her cherub-cheeked face. Although I knew she was only eighteen, her heavy matte makeup, dark-lined eyes, too-rosy streaks of blush, and prominent blue eyeshadow made her look much older. Lack of sleep and worry lines didn't help. Not to mention dealing with the news that one of your colleagues had been killed.

"What did they say to the reps?" I asked.

"I have to get back," she said abruptly. "Come with me? I'd like to talk to you, since we didn't really have a chance yesterday. And it seems as if we never get to when we're in the neighborhood. You're always cooking or going off somewhere, and I have Colin to take care of, since Mom never feels very well...."

I glanced at my watch again: nine-twenty. There was still no sign of the goateed health inspector, and I did want to get the second half of my banquet payment from Mignon before things got too busy.... Nodding to Dusty, I quickly removed the juicy ribs from the grill and drafted a food fair volunteer to guard my supplies for twenty minutes. Then I picked up my coffee and walked with Dusty to Prince & Grogan.

"How is your mother, Dusty? I haven't seen her for a while."

Dusty snorted. "Heartbroken."

"Heartbroken?" I repeated. "Why?"

"Well," said Dusty as she finished her first cookie. "First she fell in love with my dad, had me, and then he left. They never got married, and of course I never knew him. So good old Mom worked hard as a secretary to raise me, and then, not too long ago, she got a chance to have a house, finally, through Habitat for Humanity. And what did she do? Fell in love with the plumber. The plumber working on the Habitat house! She was thirty-eight, he was twenty-five, but never mind! That woman, my dear mother, is gorgeous, she's pa.s.sionate, she has no idea of the meaning of birth control. So the plumber got her pregnant with Colin, and it's bye-bye Aspen Meadow Plumbing Service! I heard from somebody that he drove his little pipe-filled pickup truck to the Western Slope, where he could start all over, donating his services to charity." Through a bite of biscotti, she mumbled, "At a discount."

"I'm sorry." Actually, I knew the details of this particular story from Marla. Strikingly stunning Sally Routt, Dusty's mother, a single mother with an aging father and a teenage daughter, had become involved with the young, plain-looking town plumber. Had Sally hoped he would marry her when she became pregnant? Who knew? I never saw Sally Routt when she was expecting, because she'd gone into seclusion, and then reportedly suffered through a difficult, premature childbirth. The plumber, with his sad round face and round eyes behind gla.s.s-rimmed spectacles, had departed Aspen Meadow at night, leaving behind accounts receivable and one emotional debt unpaid.

"Don't tell the people at your church, okay?" Dusty pleaded, suddenly conscience-stricken. "Heartbroken or not, Mom's living in fear that she'll lose the house on, like, moral grounds."

It was all I could do not to laugh. For Dusty to think that her mother's sad tale had not flowed through our parish with the speed of water through broken pipes was painfully naive. On the other hand, n.o.body in town seemed to know why Dusty had been expelled from Elk Park Prep, so maybe you could keep some secrets in Aspen Meadow. But at least the Routts were managing to keep a part of their bad news under wraps. "Well," I said, "are you recovering from hearing about Claire's death? How did you finally hear about what happened, anyway?"

"Recovering? How can you recover from that? Nick Gentileschi, head of security, called everybody Wednesday night to tell us the bad news." She shuddered, then daintily bit into another cookie. "You might have seen Nick day before yesterday? He was outside in the garage with the guys from Mignon, when they were watching for those stupid demonstrators. He was, like, crying and all on the phone," she went on. "Nick really thought a lot of Claire. Everybody did, actually. You could talk to her, and she was so enthusiastic about the products.... Anyway, he said it was a hit-and-run and they were going to step up the security police patrols of the parking garage, to look for careless drivers. I'm thinking, like, it's a little late for that. You know?"

I thought of Julian sobbing in my arms. Maybe Nick Gentileschi and I could have a little chat. After I got my check, of course.

"Dusty?" I said suddenly. "Do you want to have lunch?"

To my dismay, she became embarra.s.sed. We were standing awkwardly in the mall hallway outside the Prince & Grogan entrance. "You want to have lunch with me? Why? You mean as part of the food fair?"

"Sure. I have a friend in the hospital across the street-" This wasn't coming out right. And I need to pa.s.s the time before visiting hours? And I want to know what's really going on at that cosmetics counter? What kind of problems does the department store have, exactly? No, those explanations wouldn't wash. "I have a friend in the hospital across the street, and she loves fattening food but can't have any." I stopped to think. How much cash did I have? For all my worry about money, I carried little beyond a single credit card and an emergency hundred-dollar bill. Dusty was looking at me with raised, perfectly plucked eyebrows. Her eyeshadow this morning gleamed like the hummingbirds in Tom's garden.

"You're going to eat for your friend?" she asked. "That is radical, I've never heard of being sympathetic like that, I'm like, totally blown away-"

"No, that's not exactly it." We walked inside. "Here's what I was thinking," I said. "You could sell me something that I can take to my friend. Hand cream, lipstick, makeup, I don't care. Then we can go around and sample the food fair. Twelve-fifteen? I'll pick you up?"

"Actually," she said in a low, hesitant voice, "no, I can't do it. If that's okay. I'm behind on my sales for the last two months, so I've been asking to work through the noon hour. That's when most of the women shop. You know, they're on their lunch hours. Or businessmen visit us then, for their wives' birthdays, and they want to buy perfume or something.... Why don't you come in and get your stuff when you finish at the fair?" She swallowed the last bit of cookie and attempted a cheerful grin. "But I need to go now."

We had arrived at the long, brightly lit Mignon counter. It faced the store entrance, prime shopping s.p.a.ce that Mignon used to good advantage with sparkling mirrors, gilt decorations, and several video screens. I promised Dusty I'd see her later, then stood transfixed in front of the video screens. In my hurry yesterday, I had not stopped to watch the short films. The first showed impossibly thin twenty-year-old women frolicking beside a fountain. Gaping at them were what looked like well-built Italian movie stars posing as construction workers. Another video showed people clapping wildly as skinny models sashayed down runways wearing dresses that dripped long strands of beads. They were not the kind of outfits I could wear to the grocery store. But it was the third film that made me groan aloud. A lovely young woman knelt by the flat tire on her car just as an impossibly gorgeous guy drove up in his white convertible. Within five seconds she was driving off in the convertible with the fellow. With Mignon makeup, the video implied, you can even save on Triple-A dues!

Harriet Wells appeared and gave me a huge smile. The head sales a.s.sociate wore her green smock and diamond-cl.u.s.ter earrings, and as usual her spun-gold hair was done up in an impeccable twist. "The caterer again!" she exclaimed. "Nick Gentileschi was looking for you, something about your check. Want me to see if he's in his office?"

I nodded. "That would be great, thanks."

She drew out a foil-wrapped package from underneath the counter. "My spice m.u.f.fins. Why don't you try one and tell me what you think is in it?" She treated me to another sparkling grin. "Free perfume sample if you guess correctly. I'll be right back." And with that, she turned on her high heels and moved to the phone by the cash register.

The foil crinkled in my hand. I didn't really care about perfume samples, but I was a sucker for a bet on my tasting abilities. The m.u.f.fins were tiny and golden, and flecked with something brown. I took a bite and then another: crunchy, with zucchini and cinnamon. Delicious. As I calculated what it would take to reproduce them-honey for the sweetener, large, ripe, extra-juicy zucchini, filberts chopped fine ... I had the uncomfortable feeling that I was being watched.

I glanced around to the shoe department. A tall man with wild, white-blond hair had been looking at sale espadrilles. Now he was staring at me with his mouth open. Maybe it was against the rules to eat m.u.f.fins inside the store. I swallowed the last bite, straightened up, and pretended to be studying the face cream display that cried: You deserve to be retextured! There was a tipped mirror a little farther down the counter. I moseyed over and acted preoccupied with my reflection.

Harriet's smile was icy when she returned to me. "The head of security is occupied and can't look for your check at the moment. He wanted to know if you could come back later?"

Occupied doing what, I wondered. Clearly Harriet was also upset that the head of security was unavailable.

I said that was fine, thanked Harriet, and told her her m.u.f.fin was made with zucchini, filberts, and cinnamon. She laughed her high tinkling laugh and rewarded me with two perfume samples: One was called Foreplay and the other was Lies. I never wanted the samples, I just wanted the m.u.f.fin. Oh, well.

Back at the food fair, I tossed the samples into the same trash can where I'd thrown Pete's pamphlet and hustled back to my booth. The volunteer was happy to be relieved. I put the first batch of ribs back on the grill, readied the second batch, and lit the Sterno for the chafers. As promised, another of the fair volunteers brought hot water for the bain-marie, the water bath for the chafing dish. This was so that as soon as the first batch of ribs was done, I could move the meat into a heated serving area. And none too soon, as the health inspector showed up just slightly later than scheduled. He impa.s.sively surveyed the spread and plunked his trusty thermometer first into the pile of cooked ribs, then the salad being kept cold in the speed cart. He wiped, the thermometer meticulously each time, giving a little nod. He asked to see the bleach water and I showed it to him. Then he nodded approvingly, refused a cookie, and moved on to the next booth.

Within moments the first batch of visitors shaking their little food fair bracelets appeared on our line of booths. The mall walkers, who had cl.u.s.tered, giggling, around Pete's coffee machine, descended on my booth as if they hadn't eaten in a month. The ribs bubbled invitingly in the barbecue sauce, and I transferred two at a time from the chafer to small paper plates next to the cups of strawberry-sugar snap pea salad, slices of cranberry bread, and piles of frosted fudge cookies. Cries of "Oh, no, I'm supposed to buy a bathing suit today" did not remotely allay appet.i.tes. Thank goodness. Hunger makes the best sauce, my two-hundred-fifty-pound fourth-grade teacher had once said, and it seemed she was right.

For the next two hours I was so busy filling plates, cooking ribs, and chatting with shoppers about how Goldilocks' Catering could turn their next party into an event that I barely noticed anything outside my own food s.p.a.ce. At eleven fifty-five, however, the two co-owners of Upcountry Barbecue showed up to claim my booth, and I was forced to take stock.

"Aw, no, Roger," exclaimed one, "she's got barbecue too! This is gonna ruin us!"

"I don't see any Rocky Mountain oysters," replied Roger with a smirk. "You gal-cooks just don't have the guts to serve real western food. Ain't that right?"

I grinned at Roger and his partner. "I know the women who frequent this mall will love the sliced reproductive organ of buffalo. Especially if you roast 'em, put 'em on croissants, and tell the gals exactly what you're serving. Ain't that right, boys?"

Roger and partner exchanged a rueful glance. They'd forgotten the d.a.m.n croissants.

My food was gone. A hundred fifty portions in two morning hours wasn't bad, I figured, and I'd given out over a hundred menus and price lists. The grills and speed cart would be cleaned by the food fair staff and stay locked in place, so I had only one box of supplies to take down to the van. Once the box was stashed, I leaned against the closed van doors. Sudden inactivity made me realize just how hot and exhausted I was. I'd get my check, chat with Dusty, reconnoiter with Julian, visit Marla, then go home and crash. At least that was what I planned as I hauled myself up and walked down toward the entrance to Prince & Grogan. Before I could get there, however, I stopped and shuddered.

Maybe I have too active an imagination. Maybe I watch too many movie reruns with Arch. But seeing people-or even those boys in the film version of Lord of the Flies-wearing war paint just sends fear ripping through my bloodstream. People can hide their basest selves behind a veneer of fierce black and white stripes. Transformed, they can claim not to be responsible for what they do. I didn't know whether I was willing to be the victim of irresponsible aggression as I now stood facing at least sixty war-painted demonstrators jostling each other and their signs in back of police sawhorses by the Prince & Grogan entrance.