Fox Island (13 page)

“Really? Do you think a VW bus still makes a
political statement? I wonder if I should buy a different car? Oh,
man, I just remembered that pizza is still out there. I’ll see you
later. Go ahead and have a quiet supper.”

Melody was out the door when Tony shoved his
chair away from the table. “She’s never going to move into Kim’s
cabin, is she?”

“Not until we make her.”

“It’s like having another daughter.”

“She’s sort of halfway in between Kit and
Kathy, don’t you think?”

“I miss our girls,” Tony mused. “They both
have their quirks, but at least we’re used to them.”

“Why don’t you call our quirky daughters?
You haven’t talked to them in a week.”

Tony dialed the Scottsdale number. A male
voice answered. “This is Anthony Shadowbrook. With whom am I
speaking?”

“He ain’t here.”

“Who?”

“Anthony Shadowbrook. He’s gone to Alaska or
someplace. You want to talk to his daughter?”

“Please.”

“Hello?”

“Kath? It’s Dad.”

“Oh, hi, Daddy. Hey, everyone, quiet down.
It’s my father.”

“What’s going on?”

“The college and career Bible study needed a
place to meet. I knew you and Mom wouldn’t care... right?”

“Yeah... well... I think so. Anyway, I’m
just checking on you. Is everything going well?”

“Everything’s great, Daddy. Really. There’s
this neat guy at work who sure is hanging around me a lot. He’s
totally cute.”

“How about Kit? Did she get rid of the
calf?”

“Not yet.”

“Can I speak to her?”

“She’s not home.”

“Where is she?”

“She... went down to Mesa to look for a
job.”

“A job? She already has a job.”

“She got fired from the Speedy Squirt
place.”

“Fired? When?”

“Who got fired?” Price interrupted.

Tony covered the receiver. “Kit.” He removed
his hand. “What happened, Kathy?”

“She lubed the boss.”

“What?”

Price frowned at him.

Tony ignored her. “Kath, what exactly does
that mean?”

“I’d better have her call you. Are you going
to be at the house tonight?”

“We’ll be at a meeting until, oh, say, 9:00.
Have her call right after that.”

“Okay, Daddy. Are you and Mom having a neat
time all alone up there?”

“It’s a ... we’re getting ... yeah, it’s a
nice location.”

“I told everyone about the possibility
of
Shotgun Creek
being a
movie. We’re all praying for you.”

“Thanks, kiddo. You make sure to have Kit
give me a call.” Tony hung up and stared at Price. “I have no idea
in the world what it means, but she lubed her boss. Not only that,
but there are fifty college kids at a Bible study in our living
room.”

“The house will be a mess.”

“Kath will clean up. You know how addicted
to neatness she is.”

“Maybe we ought to go home,” Price
suggested.

“Are you kidding? The book isn’t half
done.”

“For a few days, to settle things down, then
come back.”

“We’ve got to turn them loose, Mama.”

“In our living room?”

“Yep.”

Price ate the last bit of green beans dunked
in garlic butter sauce. “I feel very anxious and insecure being
here when the girls need me at home.”

“They didn’t say they needed you,” Tony
reminded her.

“Well, they do, and you know it.”

“Kit will have a good reason.”

“For lubing the boss?”

“Yep.”

“Well, we’ll have to get home from that
community meeting by nine.”

“Sure.” Tony speared another piece of
chicken. “How long could it take to decide on a petting zoo?”

At 11:15 P.M., Price and Melody crashed
through the front door of the house. Tony had just hung up the
receiver.

“How long have you been on the phone?”

“Oh, Kit didn’t call until ten minutes ago.
How did the meeting go after I left?”

“Pretty wild. You missed the best part.
What’s the deal with Kit?”

“I learned what ‘lubing the boss’ means.
What about the meeting?”

“Harvey Peterson showed up with a chain saw.
Now, explain Kit.”

“Wait, wait, wait!” Melody broke in. “This
is worse than trying to watch a tennis match. How about one
conversation at a time?”

“Okay,” Tony said, “tell me about the
meeting.”

“No, that can wait. Tell me about our
daughter.”

“What did Harvey do with the chain saw?”

“What did Kit do to her boss?”

“That’s it, I’m out of here,” Melody
asserted. “I’ve heard of plots and subplots in novels, but not in
conversations. After that meeting and the hairy ride home, I need a
little peace and quiet. Sorry to leave you without a moderator, but
I’m going to bed.” They heard the front door click shut. Price put
a pot of water on the stove’s back burner.

“What did she mean a ‘hairy ride home’? I
thought you said there would be no problem catching a lift after I
had to leave early?”

“There was no problem. Kenny Mallard brought
us home.”

“On his Harley?”

“Yeah.”

“Both of you?”

“Yes.”

“At the same time?”

Price laughed and ran her fingers through
her hair. She noticed once again how long it was getting and
determined to ask Melody to recommend a beauty shop. “It was quite
an adventure.”

“I don’t want to hear about it.”

She smiled and stuck a bag of Stash Licorice
tea into her newly acquired Fox Island mug, the one encircled with
Clay Babies. “Good. Tell me all about Kit, then I’ll tell you about
the meeting.”

“No, I’ll tell you about Kit. Then I’ll tell
you about Kathy. And then you can tell me about the meeting. Get
your hot tea and come relax. We both need to sit down.”

“Oh, joy. Kathy, too, huh?” Price slunk into
the navy stuffed chair and inhaled the licorice scent.

Tony stretched out on the carpet after
folding scattered pages of
The Peninsula
Gateway
and tossing them next to the fireplace. “Well,
here goes. Mr. Conesco, Kit’s boss, came back to work today after
lunch and showed Kit the new uniform he wanted her to wear ... hot
pink shorts and halter. He told Kit he was giving her a raise and
wanted her to work out front lining up the paperwork on the cars as
they drove in.”

Price plopped her tea next to the seashell
lamp. “Wearing hot pink shorts and halter?”

“You got it.”

“But that’s ... that’s sexual harassment or
something, isn’t it?”

“Well, Kit wasn’t about to wear those
clothes or give up any job that had to do with working on
cars.”

“So, she quit?”

Tony waved his hand. “Wait now. Kit was
ticked off. She said she’d be happy to wear the shorts and halter
as soon as all the men who worked there agreed to wear the skimpy
hot pink outfits.”

Price snickered. “Well, I guess she would
say something like that.”

“Conesco went into a tirade about how he was
the boss and she would do what he said or get fired.”

“Nice guy. So what did Kit do?”

Tony began to laugh. It started with a fit
of chuckles and expanded to a full-scale, uncontrolled series of
war whoops.

“Get a grip, Shadowbrook. This is
serious.”

“Then, she ... he, she ... shoved ... the
lube gun ... into his Dockers ... and... and... pulled the
trigger.”

Price slid back against the chair’s stuffed
cushion and shut her eyes tight.

Tony’s guffaws slowly wound down as tears
streamed. He wiped his eyes with his shirt sleeve, the new Roper
shirt with the black horse silhouettes. “When she jumped into her
truck and drove off, he was still screaming curses and running
around like a snake bit him.”

“At least she didn’t punch the guy’s lights
out this time.”

“I guess she went home, changed clothes,
drove straight to Mesa and promptly got herself a job at an auto
parts store.”

“I hope they didn’t ask for references.”

“It’s owned by the father of someone she met
at the drag races.”

“Is she doing all right?”

“She told me she spent time out at South
Mountain Park. She suspects the Lord wants her to apologize, but
she’s still too angry. She said she was going to write Conesco an
apology and have Josh deliver it when he picks up her check.”

“She talked to her brother? What did Josh
say about all this?”

“I think his exact words were, ‘I’d be happy
to stop by and face down the sleazy creep.’”

“We need to be home.”

“They’ll survive, Dr. Shadowbrook. Kit
thinks it’ll all work out. She told us not to worry.”

“Yeah, sure. I’ve worried about those two
since the day they were born.”

“Mama, you’ve worried about Mark and Josh
just the same.”

But son worries fell into a whole different
category than daughter worries. The girls definitely needed their
mom there to coach them along. “What’s this with Kathy?” she
asked.

“It seems this totally awesome guy at work
came to the Bible study tonight. But he was having some kind of car
problem with his new Camaro convertible, so Kathy invited him to
stay until Kit came back, so she could look at it.”

“But Kit got home late....”

“At which time Kathy and this guy, Linc,
were in the swimming pool.”

“Doing what?”

“Swimming, I guess. Kathy said it’s still
over a hundred in Scottsdale. Well, Kit fixed his car, while this
guy stood around dripping water off his bathing suit and visited
with her. She said he was a pretty neat guy, but said he had poor
taste in girls.”

“And Kathy said?”

“She said Kit was trying to hit on Linc, and
if she didn’t stop, she would rip her lips off.”

“Kit? Making a pass at a boy? And what did
you say?”

“I said for Kit to write the apology to her
former boss, for Josh to deliver it without commentary and pick up
her check. Then I told Kathy it didn’t look right to have a male
guest over to swim after dark, no matter what the excuse.”

“That’s all you told them?”

“No, I said their mother would call them
tomorrow and give them both a long lecture.”

“Me?”

“Yeah, you’re Dr. Mama, the professor.” Tony
took a deep breath and sighed. “Okay, now it’s your turn. No more
stalling. What happened at the community meeting?”

“Wait a minute... my head’s still buzzing.
Do you want me to warm up some coffee for you? I need another cup
of tea.”

“That would be great. You know what, babe?
I’m trying to figure out which daughter we should be more worried
about. I suppose that’s why parents have gray hair, isn’t it?”

“Yes, but gray hair looks distinguished on
men.” Price headed to the kitchen.

“listen, kid, you’re way too defensive over
a couple of strands of gray. Why, you don’t look a day over...
say... fifty.”

Tony didn’t even see the square leather
pillow that sailed toward his head.

They sat at opposite ends of the sofa. He
chugged coffee. She sipped scalding tea. Price tugged both shoes
off and tucked her legs under her. Tony used a Time magazine on the
end table as a coaster for the heels of his cowboy boots.

“Okay,” he began, “when I left, a short
dynamo named Ms. Tulip, or Miss Tulip, stood up, with a braid as
pretty as a bronc rein hanging to her knees. Tulip
Something-Or-Other protested the inhumane treatment of animals by
the Cascade KidsCan Pet, Inc.”

“Was that before or after Harvey Peterson
ranted and raved about dismantling the bridge and bringing back the
ferry?”

“What?”

She cleared her voice to the semblance of a
deep bass. “‘Before the bridge, we didn’t have scumbags like you
polluting our island.’”

“He actually said scumbags?”

“Yep.”

“How did that go over?”

“The animal rights crowd stood in unison,
gave Harvey a ‘Heil Hitler’ salute and called him a fascist.”

“I don’t suppose that sat well with
Harvey?”

“He turned red in the face and said the Fox
Island cemetery held the graves of his oldest brother, his uncle
and a cousin, who all died fighting fascists. Their outburst was an
insult to the memory of many fine Fox Islanders, and he’d gladly
step outside with any or all of the... I think his words were
‘puke-faced wimps.’”

“He called them all out?”

“Yes, but they reminded him they only
practiced nonviolence.”

Tony leaned his head on the back of the
cushion. “That reminds me, we ought to spend a couple hours at the
cemetery reading the tombstones. Could be a story there.”

Price unfolded her legs from beneath
her.

“Go on,” Tony urged. “What happened
next?”

“Well, they finally got some order into the
meeting, then the Wild and Free bunch ...”

“Where does the Wild and Free title come
from?”

“I think it’s a national group or something.
Several were from out of the state. Tulip lives here on the Island,
though. Melody says she’s been here for years. Anyway, they made a
big case over Ho Chow.”

“Who?”

“A Vietnamese pot-bellied pig. They had a
huge blowup of an article in a newspaper in Oregon when Cascade
KidsCan Pet, Inc., held their petting zoo in a shopping center at
Beaverton. The charge was that they so neglected the animals that
Ho Chow died of starvation.”

“Could be they have a case. How did KidsCan
Pet, Inc., respond to that?” Tony asked.

“Their representative insisted the person
responsible had been fired and such a thing wouldn’t happen
again.”

“Both sides have a point. Sounds like an
impasse.”

“For the next two hours everybody in the
building gave their opinion on everything from the Vietnam War to
the need to overhaul the income tax to the safe and sane disposal
of nuclear waste.”

“Were any decisions made?”