Getting Old Is Criminal (16 page)

TWENTY-ONE

ON THE TERR ACE

W
e’re Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire, Evvie
thinks, as she looks around the terrace. The
two of them dressed in glamorous evening wear, a
full glorious moon, and the weather, Florida’s best,
balmy and soft. The kind of night for falling in
love.

“Don’t move.” Philip stands with his arms outstretched. “I want to remember you just the way
you are. My lady in red.”

“I was just imagining Fred Astaire. That’s the
kind of beautiful thing he would say to Ginger.”

“And rightly so. This is indeed a cinematic moment. Remember in
Top Hat
they danced on such
a set as this?”

“You like movies?”

“I am a devotee. I’m mad about them.”

G e t t i n g O l d I s C r i m i n a l • 1 5 5

“Then you are a man after my own heart. I’m
crazy about them, too.”

His voice lowers. “I hope so. That I am a man
after your heart.” He steps toward her. “Do you
have any idea how beautiful you are?” He reaches
out and takes each end of the scarlet boa and pulls
her slowly toward him, sliding his hands up the
boa until he brings her close enough to kiss her.

Taking her gently into his arms, Philip leads her
into a fox-trot.

“There’s no music,” Evvie says.

“We don’t need any music.”

Is this me? Evvie thinks. This poor girl from the
Bronx? Who went to movies as a child to drink in
the beauty of how other people lived? To dream of
how life could be if her parents hadn’t been poor
immigrants, hardly able to speak the language of
this country they so luckily adopted?

“Beautiful lady in red,” Philip murmurs in her
ear, and she shudders with pleasure.

Is this gorgeous man holding me? Is this the
man of my dreams? Can a girl fall in love at first
sight like they do in the movies?

“Yes, dear?” she murmurs.

He whispers in her ear, “I’m Philip.”

“I’m Evelyn,” she whispers back.

He begins to sing. “ ‘I never will forget the way
you look tonight . . . My lady in red.’ ”

TWENTY-TWO

WHEN THE

LOVE BUG BITES

It’s midnight and I’ve been pacing, seems like forever. Finally, I hear the key turn in the lock. I listen at the front door. I hear two voices mumbling in the hallway. Then the door closes. Is she alone?

A moment later, Evvie pounds on our adjoining door and comes prancing in.

“Bingo,” she says, whirling me around. “We’re in.”

I force her to let go of me. “Where have you been?”

She looks at me strangely. “What are you—my mother?”

“I’ve been waiting for hours.”

“And I’ve been on the job.”

“Really? What have you learned about our alleged, possibly dangerous, killer?”

She grins. “That he loves champagne. He loves G e t t i n g O l d I s C r i m i n a l • 1 5 7

to dance. He simply
loooves
beautiful women.”

She preens, satisfied with herself. “Did I look gorgeous tonight, or what?”

“That’s it? Nothing about his background?”

“Give me a break. I’ve only just begun.” She hums the once-popular song those words came from.

I grimace.

“Lighten up. Isn’t this what we planned? We needed to get closer to him. Well, babe”—she whirls herself around—“I’m as close as we can get.”

I cross my arms against my chest. “Not quite.

And how much closer are you willing to
get
?”

Evvie is puzzled. Obviously she hasn’t considered the next step.

She kicks off her heels and flops down on the couch. “What are you talking about?”

“You know darn well what I mean. He’s not looking for a buddy.” I imitate Ida as best I can.

“He’s going to want sex.”

Evvie jumps back off the couch and heads for the adjoining doors. She flings them open. “Boy, that’s gratitude!”

With that, she enters her own apartment and slams the door behind her.

I have this sudden memory of Evvie coming home with a date when she was sixteen. My mother and father didn’t trust this boy. After they interrogated her—Where did she go? What did she do?—hot-tempered Evvie ran from the room saying she was old enough to think for herself and 1 5 8 • R i t a L a k i n

nobody was going to tell her what to do. So, now I’ve become our judgmental mother? Part of me has always respected Evvie’s independence. But I still can’t resist calling after her.

“You forgot your glass slippers, Cinderella.”

*

*

*

When I lift my head off my pillow and squint to read my little clock on the side table, it’s only seven a.m. I can hear Evvie’s radio on next door. Why is she up so early? I feel bad about being so hard on her last night. Maybe we’ll have a cup of coffee together and clear the air before we go down to breakfast. I put my robe on and hurry across the bedroom and through the living room. I’m still not used to the size of this apartment. It’s so far to go from one room to the other.

I knock on her adjoining door. To my surprise, when she answers, I see she’s already dressed. In a stylish jogging outfit. And wearing makeup, with her hair smartly combed. I still can’t get over the auburn color. My gray suddenly feels very old to me. “Good morning,” I say. “You’re up early.”

“Yes.” Her voice is cool.

“How about we have coffee together before we go downstairs?”

“No time.” She looks at her fake Cartier watch.

“Philip is meeting me. We’re going jogging.”

“Jogging,” I sputter. “Since when have you ever jogged?”

“I have no time for this. He’s waiting.”

G e t t i n g O l d I s C r i m i n a l • 1 5 9

“Let me throw some clothes on and I’ll join you.

I’ll walk, though.”

“What for? I don’t need a chaperone.”

“Excuse me, I thought we were partners.”

“Hello? Don’t you get it? I don’t need you. I am perfectly capable of doing this job alone.”

Who is this stranger standing before me, coiffed and perfumed and haughty? Her nail polish perfect. When and where did she buy that outfit? In the downstairs boutique at those exorbitant prices? On Ferguson’s expense account, no doubt.

After one night of dancing, she’s actually convinced herself she’s one of them, these rich ladies of leisure?

“Evvie, what are you doing?”

She doesn’t answer me. She checks herself out in the mirror of her compact. In all the years we’ve been in Florida, she’s never owned a compact.

I blurt, childlike, “What am I supposed to do while you’re on the job?”

“Really, Glad, you’re being thick. There’s plenty to do around here. Find something.”

With that, she turns and walks out her front door.

I call softly after her, “Don’t break a leg, Miss Doris Day.”

TWENTY-THREE

IN THE GARDEN

H
ow clear the sky is. How fresh the air. Even
colors look brighter to her on this beautiful
day. Flowers toss out their delicious scents as she
passes one bed after another. The pond glistens as
she and Philip jog around it. Evvie can’t remember
the last time she felt like this. If ever.

She still treats me like the baby sister. Evvie bristles, thinking of her spat with Gladdy. She’s only
two years older, for goodness’ sake, but she acts as
if she’s the only one who behaves responsibly. She
thinks she’s in charge of our friends just because
she’s the only one who still drives, and now she
thinks she’s in charge of me, too! What about all
those years I helped raise her little Emily when she
was forced to work after Jack was killed? Granted,
G e t t i n g O l d I s C r i m i n a l • 1 6 1

I love her daughter as much as I do my own
Martha, but that’s gratitude for you.

Philip turns his head to look at her and Evvie
giggles. Slow walking with the girls around Lanai
Gardens didn’t prepare her for this. She keeps up
with him as best she can.

“Am I moving too quickly?” he asks with a
look of concern.

“Just fine. I can keep up.”

“I know you can.” But he slows slightly anyway.

A couple of women jog past them. The women
grin widely at Philip, flirting outright, ignoring
Evvie. Philip grins back.

“You’re quite the ladies’ man, aren’t you?”

“I plead guilty. Women are the much nicer sex.

They’re so soft and pliant. Are you soft and pliant,
mon amour
?”

Evvie blushes. “You’re a fast worker.”

“At our age, I should go slow?”

With that, they both break out laughing.

Philip is serious now. “Let me tell you something about me. I was raised by an elderly aunt after my parents died. She was the only family I had
left. She gave me so much love, and when she be-came terminally ill, I was devastated. I was only
thirteen at the time. But I knew it was up to me to
take care of her. It took so long for her to find
peace. It was a blessing when she finally died.”

“You mean, as a thirteen-year-old, you took
care of her alone?”

“Not quite alone. Auntie was very rich. Our
1 6 2 • R i t a L a k i n

whole family had been rich. We had servants to do
everything. But I was the one who nursed her.”

Evvie stops to sit on a bench for a short rest. She
can’t take her eyes off him. She’s never heard a
man speak so gently and so kindly.

“So, you see, as a very wealthy man, I could
spend my time as I wanted. I traveled, even dallied
with work for some years, but once I reached a
certain age, I knew I had a mission. I owed it to
my beloved aunt Dorothy. I wanted to ease the
pain of older women. I wanted to be with them, do
whatever they needed until . . . they needed me no
more.”

“And this is why you’re attracted to me?

Because of my illness?”

He sits down next to her and takes her hand.

“In this case my attraction is much more than
that.”

Evvie’s heart flutters in her chest, and she suddenly regrets having lied to Philip about being ill.

Her job was to find out if he was guilty. But what’s
she’s sensing in this lovely man makes her want to
blurt out the truth. That she’s here under false pretenses. But something stops her.

Philip kisses her hand and looks deeply into her
eyes. “It would break my heart to lose you.”

TWENTY-FOUR

BACK TO L ANAI GARDENS

Breakfast is a nightmare. I feel at a total loss.

Everyone is talking about Evvie and Phil, even my moribund group. For a change they’re not kvetching about their dead spouses and sad lives.