Promise Me A Rainbow (16 page)

“So how long have you known Joe? I’d ask him, but he didn’t say anything about you in the first place. We didn’t even know you were coming.”

“Next time I’ll make sure you get the guest list, Margaret,” Joe said. “Would you mind helping Mrs. Webber if she needs it?” he asked Catherine, his dismissal of Margaret D’Amaro bordering on rudeness.

Catherine looked from one of them to the other. She hated being caught in this kind of tension when she didn’t know what had caused it.

“You didn’t ask
me
,” Margaret said, and Joe laughed.

“Margaret, you’ve never helped in a kitchen in your life. Do you mind, Catherine?”

“Not at all,” she said, relieved to have something to do besides this verbal sparring with Margaret D’Amaro.

“Joey! Come over here!” Michael yelled.

Joe went to head off another fire, and Catherine walked away, leaving unanswered Margaret’s second question about how long she’d known her brother-in-law. Odd, Catherine thought. Joe D’Amaro wanted to make sure she herself didn’t have any false notions about there being anything but reciprocal politeness to his invitation to come here, but he seemed to want Margaret to think anything she liked.

She looked over her shoulder as she went inside the house to help Mrs. Webber. Margaret was talking intensely with Della, their heads close. Catherine had never considered herself paranoid, yet she was certain that she was the topic of Margaret and Della’s conversation.

Margaret suddenly got up from the lounge, casting a furtive look in her husband’s direction.

“Catherine?” Mrs. Webber called from the kitchen. “There you are. Fritz and I could use some help here.”

“What can I do?” Catherine asked, pushing aside her curiosity about the women in the D’Amaro family.

“Well, if you’d stir the beans so they don’t stick while Fritz and I take the rest of these plates and things out . . .”

“I can handle that. And I think you’d better hurry before there’s another fire.”

“Oh, no,” Fritz said, and Mrs. Webber laughed.

Catherine began to stir the huge pot of beans simmering on the kitchen stove. She was hungrier than she thought, and they smelled wonderful, their spicy aroma filling the small kitchen.

She looked up as the sliding doors to the patio opened again, expecting to see Fritz and Mrs. Webber coming back for another load of plastic plates and eating utensils. Della and Margaret came in instead.

“You shouldn’t be doing that,” Margaret said sweetly. “You’re a guest.”

“I don’t mind,” Catherine assured her, and she didn’t miss the look the two exchanged. “What is it?” she asked, because, whatever it was, she didn’t expect to like it, and she had no intention of being put on the defensive.

“Well, Catherine, Della had some questions. I said there was no reason why she couldn’t just ask you.”

“I was just wondering,” Della spoke up. “Dad didn’t tell us
anything
about you. You’re Fritz’s friend, right?”

“Right,” Catherine said, still stirring beans. “I told you that last Saturday at the Cotton Exchange.”

“Well, Fritz gets things mixed up sometimes.” Della shot Margaret another look that said,
See? I told you
.

“Are you a teacher or something like that?”

“Something like that,” Catherine said. “I work with pregnant teenagers so they can stay in school.”

“Oh,” Della said. “Are you . . . married?”

“No.”

“Have you ever been married?”

“Yes,” Catherine said pointedly.

“Oh,” Della said again. “Have you got any children?”

“No children.”

“Why not?”

Catherine smiled. “That, Della, is none of your business.”

Della’s face flushed, but her chin came up. “If you
had
some children and you had to give them up to your husband or something it is. I mean, if you think you’re going to marry my father . . .”

“Now why would I think that?”

“You came here . . .”

“I came here because I was invited, not because I want to marry your father.”

“You know what I mean,” Della said. She looked to Margaret for help and got none.

“No, Della,” Catherine said. “Actually, I don’t. And I doubt your father would, either.”

“I just want to know what
your
plans are—if you’re after my father or what.”

“My plans are to eat and leave. That’s all.”

“Are you going to tell him what I asked you?” she asked, her tone of voice suggesting that that possibility worried her more than she was willing to let on.

“What’s it worth to you?” Catherine asked. “If I don’t.”

Della glanced at Margaret.

“Catherine doesn’t mean . . .” Margaret began.

“Catherine does mean,” Catherine said, interrupting. “You want to strike a deal or not?”

“Like what?” Della asked.

“Like I won’t tell him about this very rude conversation if you go back out there with your friends and stay off my case. Go have a good time, Della. And don’t worry about me. Believe me. I’m just passing through.”

The sliding door opened again, and Mrs. Webber came in.

Della stood for a moment, then turned on her heel and fled.

“Catherine, you really shouldn’t have talked to her like that,” Margaret said, following after her. “I’m sure Joe wouldn’t understand
that
, either.”

“Goodness,” Mrs. Webber said. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing much,” Catherine said. “Della thinks I’m after her father.”

“Della thinks everyone is after her father—though I’m not so sure she’d be so concerned without a little encouragement from Margaret. Anyway, it looks as if you gave as good as you got. Della’s a bit headstrong and spoiled, but I have to tell you, Catherine, it’s Joe’s other daughter I’m worried about. Poor little Fritz. Who knows what’s going on in that child’s mind? Of course, she’s very taken with you. Anyone can see that.”

“I have the gnomes.”

“My dear Catherine. It’s more than that.”

Mrs. Webber stopped talking because Michael and Joe were coming in for the beans.

“Here you are, Michael,” she said. “If you can’t cook, you can carry.”

He was about to protest, but Mrs. Webber headed him off. “Joseph, why don’t you show Catherine your stained glasswork? I’m sure she’d love to see it. Michael and I will take out the beans—you carry, Michael. I’ll open the door.”

Michael suppressed a grin at Mrs. Webber’s heavy-handed maneuvering. “You got it, you good-looking thing, you.”

Catherine stood awkwardly as she was suddenly relieved of her kitchen job. She glanced at Joe, expecting to see that hard-pressed expression of his again, but it wasn’t there.

“This way, Catherine,” he said, pointing toward the living room.

The room was small and neat, like the kitchen and the rest of the house, the only decorations an array of framed photographs on the walls and mantel. She wondered idly if Della was responsible for this meticulous housekeeping. She doubted it.

The telephone rang, and Catherine wandered over to look at the photographs on the mantel while Joe answered it. The D’Amaro family, she thought, smiling a bit at the baby pictures of Charlie and Fritz. She moved to see the photograph at the end, a large head-and-shoulders shot of a man and woman—Joe D’Amaro and a woman with long golden hair.

Lisa
.

How beautiful she was. She stared dreamily into the camera, content and secure in Joe D’Amaro’s arms. He looked into the camera as well, younger, but with that same intense, blue-eyed gaze. Even then he seemed to be on guard, as if he expected the worst and he had to be ready for it.

“Okay,” Joe said behind her. He frowned suddenly, his look going to the picture.

“She’s very beautiful,” Catherine said. “Della looks very much like her.”

“That picture isn’t supposed to be in here,” he answered tersely. “Come on, I’ll show you the stained glass.”

She followed him into the small hallway to a door that led into the basement.

“Watch your step,” he said as they went down the stairs.

The basement was a combination laundry room-workshop, and he led her to a long table against the far wall.

“This is it,” he said, snapping on another light. “This is what I’m working on.” He pulled an open pattern book forward. “And this is what it will look like when it’s finished.” He showed her the picture of a lampshade that would be nothing but teardrop shapes of blue and green and lavender glass when it was finished.

She stood with her arms behind her back, careful not to touch anything, and looked at the half-finished lampshade closely. To his surprise, she laughed.

“I’m sorry,” she said immediately. “It’s just . . .”

His anger flashed. He had wanted her to appreciate the meticulous work that went into making a lampshade like this, possibly even be impressed. He did
not
want her to laugh. “Just what?” he asked.

“The incongruity.”

“I beg your pardon?”

She looked at him, and she was smiling still. “To the casual observer, Mr. D’Amaro, you are not the sort of man who has the patience to sit and do an incredible piece of work like this.”

“No?”

“No,” she assured him.

“Why?”

“Why?” She smiled again. “We don’t want to go into that, do we? I saw the other lampshades you did in Mrs. Webber’s shop. They were beautiful. This one is really . . . incredible.”

He gave a small shrug, feeling his anger dissolving. “It . . . settles me down.”

“It would put me in an institution.”

He showed her some other things—a damaged window for a small church outside Wilmington, a door panel for a restaurant that was opening in one of the old downtown buildings.

“You should see someone at the Cotton Exchange,” Catherine said. “They have some cracked stained glass in some of the transoms in the upper-level hallway. She looked up to find him staring at her. “What?”

“I . . . wanted to tell you I talked to the doctor you told me about.”

“And?” Her eyes looked into his, straightforward and calm as always, indicative as always that she was listening, interested.

He glanced at the basement stairway because he didn’t want Fritz to pop in and overhear. “I feel better. She told me to sit down with Fritz and ask her—talk to her as gently as I can. I’m going to do that when I get a break in the job we’re doing. I don’t want to start something I don’t have time to finish, and I don’t want to do it when Della and Charlie are here.”

“Joe!” Fritz called down the basement stairs. “Hurry! Charlie’s going to eat
everything
!”

“He will, too,” Joe said to Catherine. “After you.”

He rested his hand briefly in the middle of her back as they turned to leave. Once again he could smell the soft fragrance of her body, and he could feel the warmth of her skin through the silky blouse she was wearing. He didn’t realize until that moment how much he’d wanted to touch her, and how much it worried him that she didn’t seem to mind.