Taste of Honey (24 page)

When she finally glanced at her watch, she was surprised to see that nearly an hour had elapsed. “I should be going,” she said.

He saw her to the door, where he hugged her again. He smelled of oregano and something faintly smoky. “Don’t be a stranger, hear?”

“I won’t.” Oddly, she felt as if she’d known Kevin all her life.

“And if you go broke starting a business, you always know where to come for a free meal.”

“Oh, I couldn’t—”

He drew back with a grin. “Hey, what are family for?”

Kitty slid the tray of buns from the oven, looking more flushed than usual. Today was Josie Hendrick’s ninetieth birthday, and a group of former students was throwing her a party. Out front every table was filled and the tea kettles steaming. In addition to Willa and her part-time girl Suzette, Kitty had hired a pair of high school girls for the afternoon. Even so, she could hardly keep up. Only four-year-old Maddie, delighted by the fuss being made over her by Aunt Zee-Zee (as Josie was known to her) and all her friends, would have been content for it to go on forever.

“Thank God you’re here. I don’t know what I’d do without you,” Kitty told Claire.

She set the tray on the counter and pushed wisps of flyaway hair from her forehead with the back of a floury wrist. It was four o’clock and there was no sign of a letup. Through the swinging kitchen door came the din of chattering voices; children squealing with laughter; and in the thick of it all, old Josie thumping her cane.

Claire couldn’t help but smile.
She thinks I’m doing her a favor?
It was the other way around: If she hadn’t volunteered to lend a hand, she’d have spent the afternoon cleaning closets or, worse, at her desk.

She grabbed the tray with a pot holder and carried it into the front room, where the sticky buns were snatched up almost as fast as she could slide them onto a platter. The birthday girl was ensconced in a wicker chair by the window, her smudged red lipstick making her look like a very old child who’d gotten into the jam. A party hat was perched crookedly atop her snowy head and one of the guests had wound a red crepe paper streamer about her cane, making it look like a large peppermint stick.

One of the kettles behind the counter was whistling. While Suzette and her helpers cleared away cups and saucers and plates, Claire made tea the way Kitty had taught her, pouring an inch or so of boiling water into one of the teapots, no two alike, then swirling until the leaves at the bottom were thoroughly soaked before filling it to the top. She let it steep for a minute before placing it on a tray along with a silver tea strainer, creamer and sugar bowl, and small plate of lemon wedges.

Over the next hour she didn’t stop moving. There was more tea to be made, creamers to be refilled, cookies and scones and tarts to be brought in from the kitchen. Yet she never felt tired or harried. Someone had once told her—it might have been Byron—that only things you didn’t like doing were tiring, which would explain why an hour at her desk was more exhausting than five on her feet.

At a few minutes past five Josie hauled herself to her feet and everyone gathered around to sing happy birthday. When she blew out the candles on the cake—coconut with lemon filling, her favorite—the clapping was as enthusiastic as if there had been ninety instead of nine, one for each decade. Then the cake was cut and passed around. Claire noticed that Maddie had fallen asleep on the lap of a plump blond woman, the mother of two young boys who hadn’t been able to get enough of the darling little girl in her frilly pink dress. She gently scooped Maddie up and carried her upstairs to her room.

When she came back, the crowd had begun to thin out. Kitty emerged from the kitchen with a gift for Josie: a tool box containing a hammer, nails, several screwdrivers, a bottle of glue, and a can of WD-40. The old woman, diligent to the point of obsessive about pointing out every rusty hinge, wobbly table leg, and peeling section of wallpaper, enjoyed a good laugh at her own expense.

“Which reminds me”—she said as she was being half carried out the door, supported at each elbow by a pair of middle-aged men who’d probably looked nothing alike as students but who now sported matching paunches and bald crowns—“I noticed a crack in one of your plates.”

After everyone had gone, Claire enjoyed a quiet moment alone with Kitty while Willa and the girls washed up. She looked about the airy front room with its mismatched tables and chairs and its eyelet lace curtains through which the last of the sunlight sifted, casting hazy patterns over the floor below.

“I can’t remember when my feet ached this much,” she complained good-naturedly. Kitty opened her mouth, no doubt to thank her yet again, but Claire preempted her, saying, “It’s good to be back. I’ve missed this.”

“What’s to miss?” Kitty said with a laugh. “You’re over here practically every other day.”

“The only difference is I’m not getting paid for it,” Claire joked.

“Only because you won’t
let
me.”

“Consider it a labor of love.”

“You’re crazy, you know that?” Kitty shook her head, nibbling on a leftover cookie. “You make more money in an hour than I do in a day. Why on earth would you rather be
here
?”

“Look who’s talking.”

“All right. You’ve got me there.” Kitty hiked her feet onto a chair. For a moment she appeared lost in thought, perhaps remembering when she’d been a teacher like Josie. “I don’t know what it is—maybe I like feeling needed.”

Claire couldn’t have said it better. Tea & Sympathy, she thought, was as much food for the soul. People came to exchange ideas along with the latest gossip, to kick around business propositions and play chess—but mostly just to be where someone was always glad to see them and where they were welcome to stay as long as they liked.

“Maybe you need this place as much as it needs you.” Claire realized as soon as the words were out that they said as much about her as they did about Kitty.

“Oh, I don’t doubt it.” Kitty’s eyes crinkled. “Plates aren’t the only thing cracked around here.”

“I mean what I said before—I’d trade places with you in a heartbeat.”

Kitty looked as if she’d given it some thought since then. “In that case, what about our going into business together?”

“What about it?”

“I was just thinking …” One of the cats leaped onto Kitty’s lap, and she stroked it idly. “What if I were to open a branch of Tea & Sympathy? We’d be partners, only you’d be in charge of the day-to-day operation.”

It was as if Kitty had read her mind. Claire’s pulse quickened. “It would have to be somewhere outside of Miramonte, where you wouldn’t be in competition with yourself.”

The little house in Carson Springs with “loads of potential,” in the words of Matt Woodruff, popped into her head. She hadn’t dared dwell on it at the time— what would have been the point?—but now her mind raced, ahead, filled with possibilities.

Then reality stepped in, bringing her to a rude halt. “There’s just one little thing.”

“What?”

“Money.”

“True.” Every extra cent Kitty made went into Maddie’s college fund. “But there has to be a bank that’d give us a loan.”

“I don’t mean to be a party pooper, but your only collateral is this house, which is mortgaged to the hilt.” She’d drawn up Kitty’s will, so she knew exactly where her friend stood. “As for me, I’d have better luck robbing a bank than borrowing from one.”

“What about tapping some of your wealthy clients? It’d be a great investment opportunity.”

“Sure, and maybe while I’m at it I could show them a nice swamp in Florida.” A familiar heaviness was settling in—the sense of hopelessness that always followed such flights of fancy.

“I just thought of something.” Kitty brought her feet to the floor with a thump, causing the cat to leap from her lap with a look of reproach. “My sister Alex. I loaned her some money a few years back. I wasn’t expecting to be repaid any time soon, but she just landed a big commission on a house she sold. She’s giving me half, so that’s twenty grand right there. If we could scare up another twenty or so—”

“This is insane, you know that, don’t you?” Claire broke in.

“Not half as insane as
not
doing it.” Kitty’s blue eyes sparked with challenge.

For a delicious stolen moment Claire allowed herself to imagine it: her very own Tea & Sympathy. Her heart soared—then just as quickly plummeted. It was nothing short of madness. For one thing, she’d never hear the end of it from Lou and Millie. And what about Byron? They’d been counting on her income for when they were married.

Sean clomped in from outside just then. He was several weeks into a big job for the city trimming the elms along Cypress, and looked it: deeply tanned, his T-shirt and jeans smudged with tar, and a sprinkling of sawdust in his spiky black hair.

“Hold it right there.” Kitty put out a hand, stopping him at the threshold. “Boots and socks,” she ordered, waiting while he pried off his tar-stained Redwings. A small pile of sawdust appeared on the mat as he peeled off his socks. “Okay, now the rest.” She was grinning as she spoke.

Sean pretended to take her seriously, going so far as to unbuckle his belt before Kitty dashed over to throw her arms around him, mindless of the tar on his jeans. Claire couldn’t help envying them a little. But why? She had Byron, didn’t she?

But it wasn’t Byron she was thinking of now. Maybe it was the smell of sawdust, but she found herself remembering Matt Woodruff. She pictured him walking from room to room, his boots leaving faint waffled treads on the hardwood floor, the muscles in his broad back straining the faded fabric of his shirt. When it occurred to her that the house might already be sold, she felt a sudden and entirely unreasonable pang of loss.

It would be perfect, she thought. Smaller than this one and all on one level, but with a large kitchen and a garage that could be converted. And Matt had mentioned that it was zoned for commercial use.

All at once her excitement was doused by a cold dash of reason. What would it do to her parents if she moved to Carson Springs? And what would Gerry think? They’d all assume the reason she was taking such a drastic step was to get to know her family—and they’d be partly right. For over the past few weeks she’d felt something gathering in the back of her mind, nothing as definite as a decision, only the growing certainty that a change was coming, a change like warm winds blowing from the south that, if she positioned herself just right, would send her sailing off into exciting new territory. If she didn’t grab hold of this opportunity, even at the risk of hurting her parents, she knew she’d spend the rest of her life regretting it.

CHAPTER NINE

T
HE RUTTED DIRT LANE
dipped like the grooved handle of a spoon to the meadow below. Walking down it, all you saw at first was an unbroken sweep of grass bordered by wild blackberries and eucalyptus at one end and a long corrugated shed at the other. It wasn’t until you drew nearer that you saw the rows of evenly spaced hives, like a subdivision of miniature ticky-tacky white houses, tucked in among the trees.

It all looked so pastoral, but as Gerry strolled among the hives with Sister Carmela at her side, she reflected, as she often did, on the delicate thread by which their little cottage industry hung. A tiny parasite, an invasion of wild bees, even the premature death of a queen could decimate an entire colony. If enough were affected, production slowed and the honey yield dropped: like the year an infestation of foulbrood had nearly wiped out the entire apiary.

“It’s not every colony, not yet, at least.” Sister Carmela, as short and thick as Gerry was tall and shapely, stumped along the path, hands horned with calluses clasped behind her back. “We’re dosing them with fumagillin and it seems to be doing the trick, but we’ll have a better idea in a week or two. I’m hopeful.” Her flat tone and the deep lines creasing the worn leather of her face suggested otherwise.

Gerry didn’t have to be told how serious an infestation of
Nosema
was. If it wasn’t eradicated in time, the annual cleansing flight would be marked by bees crawling over the ground instead of making their springtime forays into the field.

“How many do we stand to lose?” she asked.

They paused in front of a partially dismantled hive. Its lid and shallow super had been removed, leaving only the two deep brood chambers. The ground around the hive entrance was scattered with what at first glance appeared to be blossoms from the trees overhead, but which on closer inspection Gerry recognized as dozens of dead bees.

Sister Carmela shook her head mournfully. “Nothing worth saving here.” It would be burned along with the other badly infested hives. She continued along the path, stopping to pry the lid off another hive, lifting the heavy super as easily as if it had been the lid of a Styrofoam cooler. Mindless of the bees—her skin was so tough from the years of working outdoors she no longer needed the cumbersome protective gear—she reached inside to extract a frame from the brood chamber. The bees were sluggish from winter, but looked healthy enough. Satisfied, she replaced it. “If we’re lucky, we won’t lose more than a few.”

“Let’s keep our fingers crossed.”

“I’ve done more than that. I’ve asked Father Reardon to say a special mass.”

Gerry looked for a sign that she was being facetious, but the older nun’s creased brown face was solemn. As far as Sister Carmela was concerned, it was no different than offering up prayers for a sick parishioner or family member who’d fallen ill.

“It couldn’t hurt,” she said.

Something flared in the nun’s gentle brown eyes. “Oh, I know what they say about me: All Sister Carmela cares about is those bees. But they’re God’s creatures the same as you and me.”

Gerry happened to agree, though Sister Carmela took it to extremes at times, extolling their virtues to anyone who would listen, about how bees were a model society, every member of the colony with a job to do and everything in its proper place. Rather like the convent, she thought. She slipped a comforting arm about her old friend’s shoulders. “If people were as well behaved the world would be in a lot better shape.”

She looked out over the meadow, where a few of the bees from hives with sunnier exposures were already making forays, bobbing drunkenly amid the goldenrod and timothy grass. She loved the whole concept of the cleansing flight, like spring-cleaning in a way: the bees removing those that had died over the winter, along with bits of wax and debris.

In a way, hadn’t she done the same? Decades of old regrets and wishful thinking had been swept away. Her daughter had a name and a face. She knew the color of her eyes and the sound of her laughter. She could close her eyes and see Claire at the kitchen table, in the extra chair at the end. If that memory was all God saw fit to bless her with, well, she’d just have to find a way to live with it.

Her heart ached nonetheless. Here it was March—six weeks since Claire had visited—with only the one stilted thank-you note. Her hopes had been raised when she heard from Kevin that Claire had been to see him. But he’d advised her to keep a low profile for now, saying that while Claire had seemed genuinely interested in getting to know them, her first loyalty was to her parents.

“Those people did a real number on her.” She could hear the disgust in his voice.

“What did she tell you about them?”

“Nothing much—just the impression I got. You know that expression about loving someone to death? Well, with her folks it’s literal.”

“I got the same impression.”

“The last thing she needs is another guilt trip.”

Gerry could certainly relate to that. Hadn’t she gotten a good dose from her own mother growing up? Not to mention the Church, which had had thousands of years of practice at it. “Do you think I’ll ever hear from her again?”

“Hard to say, but my guess is yes.”

Gerry’s heart had leaped. “You don’t sound too sure.”

“She’s been to see Gallagher.” Kevin’s voice hardened. “Apparently he denied the whole thing. Now she’s more confused than ever.”

She’d known this was coming, of course, but it caught her by surprise even so, nearly knocking the wind from her. She felt the old anger surface. “Oh, God, poor Claire.”

“It’s not Claire I’m worried about—it’s
him.
”

“What do you mean?”

“Just be on your guard, that’s all,” Kevin warned.

“Against what?”

“I don’t know, but something tells me we haven’t seen the last of him.”

Now, as she wandered along the shady path, Gerry wondered if her brother was right. She didn’t expect to hear from Jim—hadn’t he made it plain he wanted nothing to do with either her or Claire?—but that didn’t mean the ripple effect from Claire’s visit wouldn’t be felt. She’d best keep an eye out for trouble just in case.

When they’d finished inspecting the hives, she and Sister Carmela headed back to the honey house, where another kind of spring-cleaning was under way. Decapping tanks, extractors, strainers, and centrifuges were being scrubbed down in preparation for the combs that would soon be ready to harvest. Even Sister Paul, their resident biochemist, had gotten into the act, giving her cluttered laboratory in back—the birthplace of Blessed Bee’s brand-new line of hand creams and moisturizers—a thorough cleaning.

By the time Gerry returned to the chapter house for her interview with Marian Abrams from
West,
to which Mother Ignatius had reluctantly given her approval, it was almost noon. As she made her way through the cloister garden, her thoughts turned to the reverend mother, who’d seemed unusually subdued these past few days. Was she finally slowing down? The woman was in her late eighties, after all, though the thought of her succumbing to age was as unimaginable as the mountains crumbling.

I ought to have a word with her just in case …

Gerry was the only person Mother Ignatius would consult—not in spiritual matters, of course, but about concerns that ranged from which shade of white to paint the chapel to whether or not they ought to invest in a new car—perhaps because Gerry was the only one who didn’t tremble in her presence. If she was ailing in some way, the reverend mother would tell her.

She was nearing the chapel when she spied Sister Agnes, her old friend and onetime novice mistress, kneeling with her trowel in the garden that had been her lifelong project—one that contained every plant and tree and bush mentioned in the Bible.

Gerry stopped to peer at a laminated plaque:

OLIVE

(Olea europaea)

And the dove came in … and lo,

in her mouth was an
olive
leaf

Genesis 8:11

“Come to help me with the spring planting, are you?”

Sister Agnes peered up at her from under the brim of a floppy straw hat, shading her eyes against the sunlight: a little cupcake of a woman without a square edge or angle. Though nearly as old as Mother Ignatius, she wore her years well.

“Believe me, there’s nothing I’d like better,” Gerry answered with a sigh.

“Even God rested on the seventh day.” Sister Agnes’s apple cheeks shone as if polished, and a silvery wisp had escaped from under her wimple. “What is it you’re so busy rushing off to you can’t spare a moment to enjoy a bit of fresh air and sunshine?”

Gerry told her about Marian Abrams. “Heaven knows we could use some good publicity for a change.” She held back from adding,
After the ordeal with Sister Beatrice.

But Sister Agnes must have read her mind, for she settled back on her heels, making the sign of the cross. “The poor woman—I hope she’s found some comfort.”

Only Sister Agnes would be so forgiving of someone who’d taken two innocent lives and nearly a third— Sam’s. “I’m sure she has,” Gerry said, thinking that in the psychiatric hospital to which she’d been confined, Sister Beatrice had to be heavily medicated at least.

“I pray for her every day.”

Gerry knew what her former novice mistress was thinking—that no one was without sin. What would the other sisters think if they knew that Sister Agnes had been caught shoplifting in Delarosa’s a few months back? If it hadn’t been for Sam’s discretion in handling it, she might have spent some time behind bars as well. Though Gerry could hardly compare a weakness for pretty things to the homicidal acts of a madwoman.

“I’m just glad it’s behind us,” she said.

“Yes, though it’s certainly taken its toll. Our reverend mother doesn’t look at all well these days.”

So Sister Agnes had noticed it, too. “Has she said anything to you?”

The little nun shook her head. Crouched on her haunches, she looked like one of the wild hares Gerry often spotted early in the morning on her way to work, frozen amid the tall grass. “Do you think—?” Sister Agnes broke off, not daring to voice her fears. The threat of illness, especially Alzheimer’s, hung over the community’s mostly aged population like a pall.

Gerry saw the concern in her eyes, and knew she was thinking of poor old Sister Seraphina, clinging to life by a thread. “I’ll see what I can find out.”

Sister Agnes rose to her full height—the top of her head barely reached past Gerry’s shoulder—and laid a hand on her arm. It was the size of a child’s but roughened from years of outdoor work. “You’d tell me, wouldn’t you? If something
were
wrong.”

“You’d be the first to know,” Gerry assured her.

Sister Agnes caught up with her as she started down the path. She was carrying a basket from which a bunch of lavender poked, tied together with a piece of rough string. She caught Gerry’s glance and said, “It’s for Sister Seraphina. They’re saying she can’t hold on much longer, that she wouldn’t know her own mother from a hole in the wall, but I’m thinking she can’t be too far gone for a little breath of the outdoors.”

Gerry smiled. “I’m sure she’ll appreciate it.”

“ ’Tis an awful pity.”

“Her being so sick?”

“No, not that—we all have to die sometime. It just seems a shame, that’s all, her being robbed of her thunder.” A reference, no doubt, to the numerous false alarms that would make Sister Seraphina’s death, when it came, seem anticlimactic.

They strolled past the chapel along the covered walkway lined with bas-reliefs—fourteen of them, one for every Station of the Cross. When they reached the path that led to the infirmary, Gerry paused to help herself to a sprig of lavender, holding it to her nose and breathing in its fragrant scent. She was about to put it back when Sister Agnes took it from her, tucking it in a buttonhole in Gerry’s sweater instead. “For luck.” Her eyes were the violet-blue of the lavender.

“Thanks.” A small gesture, but Gerry felt moved; it was as if Sister Agnes had read her mind. She glanced about before bending down to give Sister Agnes a quick peck on the cheek. Displays of affection were frowned on here and as the lone lay member of the community she had to be more careful than most.

Minutes later she was seated in the reverend mother’s office two doors down from hers. The window was open, letting in a mild breeze scented with jasmine—a reminder that spring was just around the corner. It was also the only indication that any time had passed since she’d last sat here. For as long as she’d been at Our Lady, the sturdy oak desk across from her had held the same ink-stained blotter and vintage metal fan propped on a volume of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica,
and the bookcase had been home to the same cracked leather spines. The plain wooden crucifix and faded tapestry—Mary kneeling before the Angel Gabriel—had hung on the walls since Mother Hortense’s time, the only things saving them from being utterly bare.

Mother Ignatius was seated in the chair behind her desk regarding Gerry somberly. “I hadn’t planned on saying anything until I knew for sure,” she said, her hands folded on the blotter in front of her. “Someone from the mother-house alerted me last week—I’m not saying who—but it wasn’t until a few hours ago that it was confirmed. Mother Edward called to let me know they’re sending someone—a Sister Clement—to do an evaluation. Based on her report, they may make some changes.”

“What kind of changes?” A stitch formed in Gerry’s belly.

“I can’t be sure”—she paused—”but I had the distinct feeling it has something to do with you.”

“Me?”

“Mother Edward seemed quite curious about you. She wanted to know what, if any, involvement you had with the community outside of Blessed Bee and what effect your, shall I say, secular, influence might have had on us.” She lifted a hand, holding it out as if to caution Gerry not to jump to any conclusions. “Maybe I’m reading too much into it. After what happened with Sister Beatrice we’re all a bit skittish.”

The stitch in Gerry’s belly tightened. “Are you saying I could be fired?”