The Mysterious Disappearance of the Reluctant Book Fairy Page 5

  “That ship has sailed,” Monie announced tartly. “If you think you can say ‘sorry folks but we’re only doing eight journeys a day’ from now on, you’re wackier than you look.”

  Mildred, determined not to be sidelined by slings and arrows of outrageous anything, took a breath and said, “Perhaps a holiday …? There’s that spa at the Tulalip casino over town. I’ve never been—can you see me at a spa? Ha ha—but a few days there, and she’ll be right as rain.”

  “And then what?” Monie Reardon Pillerton demanded. “I’ll tell you then what: It starts all over again. And do you really expect no one to follow her over there to that casino? Someone shows up in Langley desperate to … I don’t know … hunt the hound of the Baskervilles—”

  Not a bad suggestion, Mildred thought. And a very good replacement for the occasional elderly woman wishing to experience the sleuthing of those terminal dullards Poirot and Marple. No overt violence in Sherlock Holmes and certainly no sex to offend—

  “Are you listening to me, Mildred?”

  “Of course, of course,” Mildred told her. She couldn’t, she reassured herself, help it if her mind went commercial so easily. It was how she was wired. “You’re saying she’d be followed.”

  “By smart, phone-wielding, wannabe travelers eager to post selfies online. Me and Annapurna in Langley. Me and Annapurna in the ferry line. Me and Annapurna on the ferry. Me and Annapurna waiting for our massages at Tulalip Spa. And, oh, while you’re waiting to be called for your massage, Annapurna, couldn’t you just send me to Venice to watch that little gnome or whatever she was knife the poor narrator who only wants his little daughter to come back to life?”

  “Don’t Look Now?” Mildred said. “That could be a fine replacement for that insipid Pray, Eat, Vomit or whatever it’s called. You know the book I mean, I’ll wager. Whatsername traveling to exotic places to mend her broken heart and incidentally meet the next man to break it. Puhleez.”

  “Stop it! We’re talking about Annapurna. We’re talking about her having a life. We’re talking about saving her life, which isn’t going to happen if you can’t get your head out of the cash register for a minute.”

  But the sad truth was, with all the very best intentions in the world, Mildred Banfry could not do this. It wasn’t long into their abortive conversation—just about the time that a woman in grave need began to bang imperiously upon the rest room’s door—that Monie Reardon Pillerton recognized this. She also recognized her own responsibility in what had befallen not only her old friend but also the entire village. Had she not begged, cajoled, inveigled, and whatevered Annapurna into giving her a few minutes with Max de Winter and the eternally unnamed narrator, none of this would have happened. Thus she knew it was up to her to unhappen it in whatever manner she could.

  Monie decided that only something like the FBI’s witness protection program would do, providing Annapurna with a new identity in a place far, far, away from Whidbey Island. Only if Annapurna vanished into thin air could Langley and all of South Whidbey actually go back to the quiet, rural, lovely little place it once had been. Making this happen wouldn’t be easy, but it also wouldn’t be impossible. There were a billion and one places into which Annapurna could disappear: from Boseman, Montana, to Bangladesh. All Monie needed was the dark of night and Annapurna’s cooperation.

  This last, alas, was not to be. While Annapurna was fully on board with Monie’s conclusion that the wild success of Epic! was going to do her in, she was not about to begin life all over again, a stranger in a strange land. Her family was here—“You never see them!” did not move her—and her friends were here—“I’m the only friend you have!” did not reassure her of her ability to establish social connections elsewhere—and once Annapurna had made these declarations and accompanied them with a gentle but pointed reminder of “Let’s not forget how this all began,” Monie knew she had to come up with another plan.

  One cannot, as it is said, put the genie back into the bottle, although Monie and Annapurna did try, once Mildred agreed to the plan, of course. But they quickly discovered that a reduction in hours did not soothe the savage breasts of those who wished to experience the stillsuits and the sand worms of Dune, and closing for a day of rest did not please a particularly insistent group of elderly women with great sympathy for Miss Havisham, who were not to be denied since they’d traveled to Whidbey all the way from Fort Lauderdale on what they declared to be an exorbitantly priced excursion. These among others would have their way, and if their way was denied … well, the owners of Epic! knew all about AARP’s history of successful litigation based on false advertising, didn’t they?

  In short, Monie and Annapurna learned that she couldn’t go, she couldn’t stay, and she couldn’t have a moment to herself. Which meant she would either die with her metaphorical boots on—although Annapurna was given to wearing only sandals due to bad feet in need of surgical correction— or she was going to have to disappear. And since she refused to disappear into regions unknown to her, she was going to have to do it right there on Whidbey Island, if only Monie could figure out a way to make this happen.

  It came to her, like a bolt from Zeus, one evening in the First Street Langley Tasting Room, where she and Dwayne Pillerton had gone for the one-date-night-each-month that was supposed to keep them romantically charged, attuned to each other, desirous of each other’s tired body, and all the rest. Mostly, at the end of each day and particularly on their date nights, they just wanted to sleep. But they knew the cost of not tending to the garden of their marriage and while each secretly hoped the other would cancel the date night, neither ever did.

  First Street Langley Tasting Room was teeming with people. Monie and Dwayne huddled over their table. This was the infuriating size of a bottle cap, one of twenty replacements for the once reasonably sized café tables that had occupied the space prior to the tasting room’s wild increase in custom. Dwayne made sad note of how things had radically changed in the little village they loved, and Monie told him then and there that she intended to change things back to what they once had been.

  She didn’t need to guard her words or the volume at which she spoke them. Customers packed the wine bar cheek to jowl and elbow to elbow, and the noise was such that only a near shout sufficed to make oneself heard. She could tell that Dwayne wasn’t attending to her, and she couldn’t blame him. Everyone around them was exclaiming over the magical journeys they’d recently taken, and they were hard to ignore. The air was filled with Make her do Sergeant Havers meets Salvatore Lo Bianco! … Try that scene where Mariko sneaks into his room in the dead of night! … She’d do Tommy and Tuppence, wouldn’t she? … When Albert Campion realizes that he loves Amanda, my heart totally swooned!, all of it underscoring the veritable monster that had been created in the village.

  Dwayne knew this was all due to Epic!, of course. What he didn’t know was Monie’s part in creating the monster. She preferred it this way as she felt guilty enough already without having her husband discover that she’d been inside Max de Winter’s hotel room during his morning ablutions, no matter how innocent her intentions. Dwayne was, after all, a man dedicated to all things concrete. Not for him was the world of imagination which, as he’d been taught at the knees of his Baptist mother, was the devil’s own workshop and best avoided.

  She said to him, “We’ve got to get Annapurna away from Langley. This whole Epic! enterprise is going to kill her.”

  “Monroe’s a nice town,” was his sage advice. “And it’s got a Lowe’s.”

  Monie felt her spirits sink. Monroe? What on earth was he thinking? There was no there there, and even if there had been, did he really expect that a suburb within an hour’s drive of the ferry to Whidbey Island was going to suffice? And anyway, she wasn’t talking about Annapurna’s leaving Whidbey. Annapurna had said she wouldn’t go. Which was what Monie next asserted.

  “Oak Harbor then,” was Dwayne’s next offering, not an unreasonable one as it was some thirty plus miles
to the north of Langley with a population among whom one might be able to hide. “Walmart’s there. So’s Home Depot.”

  “Stop thinking about box stores,” Monie cried. “D’you honestly expect that Annapurna is going to be impressed by the presence of box stores?”

  “The naval air station? She might meet some officer and fall in love.”

  “God. You’re … you’re impossible,” she said. “I can’t come up with where to disappear her on my own, and if you think she’d ever consent to live in some … some completely soulless place, then—”

  Wish I could have stayed there forever! was what struck Monie to silence in the middle of her thought. I mean, why not? Couldn’t it happen? And if you’d seen the mansion, not to mention the piles of food and endless bottles of champagne … and the swimming pool! I swear to God you’d feel the same. Monie, hearing this and trying desperately not to judge the astonishing butt size of the woman who uttered it—sat up straight in her chair—the eternal posture of the eavesdropper—and picked up further with I could make him forget Daisy Buchanan in no time flat, which led Monie to Jay Gatsby first and the miraculous, obvious solution second.

  She was afire to speak to Annapurna without delay. She developed an instantaneous headache requiring Dwayne to whisk her home. There, she took an Aleve to reassure him of her intentions not to have a headache when next they met for the necessary culmination of their night of romance, and with a “Give me a half hour to recover, sweetie,” she shut herself up in their bedroom and got on the phone.

  She phoned Annapurna first. She said, “Adventure, mystery, crime, or romance?”

  “What about them?”

  “Just answer. Don’t think. Thinking always complicates a situation. Just say it quickly: adventure, mystery, crime, or romance.”

  “Who is this, please? My number’s unlisted.”

  “Who the hell do you think it is, Annapurna? I bet you haven’t had a chance to talk to your siblings or your parents in months.”

  “Ah. Monie.”

  “Ah Monie is right. This is date night. I have thirty minutes before Dwayne expects sex. Let’s get down to business. Adventure, mystery, crime, or romance. We’re talking books here. Make a choice.”

  “It’s not that easy.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’d have to say at least two of them.”

  “All right. Fine. We can work with that. Which two?”

  “Probably mystery and romance. They seem to go together, don’t they?”

  “Main character: married or single?”

  “Does it actually matter?”

  “For this. Yes. It does. Quite a bit.”

  “Married then. If not at first, then ultimately. Why not try something new?”

  “Present day?”

  On her end, Annapurna thought for a moment. “I’ve always been partial to the period between the two world wars,” she said. “There was this heightened sense of fashion, a real burst of energy, celebration of one’s survival, that sort of thing.”

  “Are you sure? The Great Depression and all that.”

  “Well, it would have to be the 20s, then, wouldn’t it? Or possibly the 30s and in the company of someone who hadn’t invested in the stock market.”

  “Country?”

  “I do love England.”

  “Ever been?”

  “In books, of course. What else could I ever afford? But not in years. You know I don’t travel like that any longer.”

  “Really? What a shame. But no matter. It’s time to start. Meet me at the old place. You know where. Set your alarm and be there at five. We’re taking care of Epic! once and for all.”

  “But Mildred will—”

  “I’ll take care of Mildred afterwards. She’s made a pile and she can close up shop and live on her part of the takings forever. You just meet me at 5:00 and have in mind where you want to go.”

  “I don’t think I can really—”

  “Hey! You listen to me, Janet Shore. How exhausted are you? How much do you hate having to talk every Tom, Dick, Jemima, and Audrey into trying Cold Mountain instead of Gone with the Wind? Has anyone ever asked for Cold Mountain on his own? Don’t even answer.”

  “One woman did want The Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All,” Annapurna said.

  “Fine. Wonderful. I’ll send up rockets. See you at 5:00. Do not be late.”

  After this, Monie put a call into Mildred. She went for her cellphone because she didn’t want to risk having to talk to the woman and since the hour was late, she felt fairly certain that Mildred would have long gone to bed, working on her own beauty rest as she denied the same to poor Annapurna.

  “Keep the shop closed tomorrow,” she said into the phone when the message signal chimed. “I’m taking Annapurna off island for the day. She needs a rest. Don’t bother to call me with an argument, either. By the time you get this, we’ll be gone.”

  And that was it. The rest of the night Monie devoted to Dwayne, an occupation that was mercifully swift. He’d always been a slam-her-and-sleep sort of lover. Ten minutes or less and she was generally left to her own devices as he rolled away and commenced huffing and snorting like a dying gladiator.

  She eased out of bed and in the kitchen she made her children’s lunches. She would not be at home to see them on their way to school, nor would she be there to make their breakfasts. She unearthed the instant oatmeal, some pecans, and a jar of honey. She hulled a large basket of strawberries and she poured milk into a jug and put it on ice. She wrote a note to each child with hearts and x’s and o’s. She would be there when they returned home from school, she told them. She packed her husband’s lunch next and she wrote him a note that told him much the same. She had responsibilities after all, no matter how she desired to escape them. She’d made her choices and she had to live with them. She only hoped that Annapurna would finally make a choice as well.

  When four-forty-five rolled around, she loaded her car with what she needed, and she drove to the Langley cemetery, easing her way cautiously along the rolling fields of an old intown farm as she kept her eye out for breakfasting deer. It was still dark but dawn was on its way. She’d seen the apricot light of it beginning to streak the sky across the water above the Cascade Mountains as she’d pulled from her driveway into the street.

  She parked as close as she could to the memorial garden for the cremated citizens of Langley. She gathered what she needed and as she was about to set off in the direction of the old potting shed, headlights made the turn from Al Anderson Road and came through the old brick pillar of the cemetery. Within moments, Annapurna had joined her.

  Annapurna had, during the long night following Monie’s call, figured out what was meant to happen. She wasn’t anyone’s fool, and the list of Monie’s questions had been similar to what she asked people who arrived at Epic! without a clue as to the level of preparation in which they should have engaged prior to making an appointment. So her first comments upon getting out of her car were those of protest. But before she could move from protest, to advise, disagree, or disavow, Monie said, “Really, Janet. It’s the only way. And you are still Janet Shore, aren’t you? Beneath all the trappings of Annapurna? You know you are and … Look, I pretty much think you have to say it. Else … I don’t think I can help you like I want to. I don’t know why but that’s how it is. You have to say it.”

  “I’m Janet,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean—”

  “Good,” Monie cut in. “Now come on. We don’t have a lot of time. What did you decide?”

  Annapurna was silent for a moment and during that moment, which stretched on and on, Monie Reardon Pillerton began to think that her old friend wasn’t as ready as she ought to have been to put aside Epic! and the life that had been thrust upon her by Mildred Banfry. But at last she took a breath and wrestled a hard bound book from the carpet bag that she was carrying. She said, “It’s a first edition, by the way. Don’t even ask how much it cost.”

 
“And does it fill the bill?”

  “It has it all: England, between the wars, mystery, and romance.”

  “What about money?”

  “Second son of a duke.”

  Monie considered this. She’d seen the TV production of Pride and Prejudice. She knew Colonel Fitzwilliam’s financial state. “But weren’t second sons always impoverished? Didn’t they all become soldiers?”

  “This one isn’t.”

  “Isn’t what? A soldier?”

  “Isn’t impoverished.”

  “You’re sure about that?”

  Newly-returned-to-Janet nodded. “He has a servant and he drives a Daimler. That’s a Jaguar. He drinks fine port. And he’s in love with a woman who doesn’t have a penny, so he’s not looking to pick up funds from a wife.”

  “Oh my God! He’s in love? Annapurna … Janet, that’s not going to work.”

  “They’re not married. He’s asked her two or three times but she’s said no. Eleven years since they first met and she’s still saying no. She says yes at the end of this one, but see how long the book is? That’ll give me time.”

  Those last words charged their way into Monie’s heart and gave her incalculable joy. “So you’re willing?” she gasped. “Really? Truly? Finally?”

  Janet looked around. “I’m tired,” she said. “This can’t go on. So, yes. I’m willing and it’s time.”

  So Monie Reardon Pillerton led her old friend Janet Shore into the darkened potting shed where she had spent so many blissful hours in days of her youth. Together they spread out the blanket that Monie had brought with her while Janet lit a candle and placed it—as she’d done so long ago—within the protection of a hurricane lamp. She sat, then, and began to leaf through the pages of her book. She was going to have to enter the story early. And she was, obviously, going to have to develop a taste for fine port as soon as she got there.