“Please. To night was all business.” I told her about the pictures on the flash drive and reeled off the shorthand descriptions on Mike’s photo log.
“Hmmm. Babhdbck. What’s that?”
“I’m guessing baby’s head, back.”
“I think I can skip that one,” she said. “Anything about the necklace?”
I didn’t know if I was supposed to be looking at the other pictures, but why not? By accident or by design, Mike had left the drive. I scrolled down to the necklace images and waited for the first to load. It was a tiny medallion on a slim chain that might have been silver. On the front was the worn image of a female saint with a border of horizontal lines emanating from her robe to the edges of the medal.
“It’s the Virgin of Guadalupe,” I said, “the patron saint of Mexico. In 1531, she revealed herself to a poor Indian named Juan Diego on the outskirts of what’s now Mexico City. Her image miraculously appeared on his cloak and supposedly it’s still there after almost five hundred years. They’re talking about making Juan Diego a saint, too.”
“I’m impressed. How do you know this? Don Felix?”
“I worked on a documentary called Religions of the World. Besides, you’ve been to Mexico. She’s everywhere, on guest soaps and shopping bags. When I was there I bought a Virgin of Guadalupe devotional candle, the thick glass kind you find in bodegas in the Bronx.
“Anyway, the Virgin told Juan Diego to climb this hill and cut some flowers. Even though it was December, and Juan Diego couldn’t believe there would be flowers growing in the winter, he climbed the hill. When he got to the top, it was covered in roses of Castile. He took them to the doubting Thomases in town, who fell to their knees at the miracle. When he dropped the flowers, the Virgin’s image was on his cloak.”
“You believe that?” she asked.
“I didn’t say I believed it. It was a souvenir. And the candle was cheaper than the Zapata T-shirt.”
“Come to think of it, I bought soap on Bourbon Street once that was supposed to wash away evil spells. I had to repeat this one line over and over while I was lathering up. Is there any writing on the medallion, you know, like a prayer or incantation?”
“You bought spell- removing soap at Marie Laveau’s and you’re giving me grief about someone twenty- six popes have recognized? Let me see.” The front was easy, Con ella todo, sin ella nada. “With her, everything, without her, nothing.” The back was trickier, a lot of microscopic writing. I squinted at the tiny, imprecise lettering. I zoomed in on the picture.
“Something she was supposed to have said to Juan Diego. ‘Let not your heart be disturbed. Do not fear the sickness. Am I not here, who is… your mother?’ Holy shit.”
“It says that?” Lucy asked.
“Up to the holy shit part. Don’t be afraid, little baby? Am I not here? Your mother? Some poor Mexican woman buried her child with this medal. Someplace she knew it wouldn’t be disturbed. A place that wouldn’t cost her anything, that she could visit as often as she wanted.”
“Did the Peacocks have any regular help?” Lucy asked.
“Not inside, only garden help. And even that stopped as they got older.”
“That’s not much help,” she said. “Ever find out what became of the real sister?”
“No. I can’t believe I keep getting suckered into telling O’Malley stuff, when he volunteers nada.”
“What did Hillary say?”
“I haven’t seen her. I have been working, you know. I’m more likely to bump into Gerald Fraser at the diner.”
“That reminds me. Dave Melnick knows him. Well, not really. Knows of. Dave’s at the Cop Channel now. I bumped into him and he asked about you, so I told him about your case, and he e-mailed me some stuff. Your Fraser’s some kind of hero cop. I don’t think they’re going ahead with it, but he was researched for an episode on a missing girl. Want me to forward what Dave sent me?”
“Great.” Maybe I’d try to see Hillary and Gerald this week.
“Jeez, ‘Am I not here… who is your mother?’“ Lucy repeated.
“Yeah,” I said, “but where?”
CHAPTER 25
Only one eye was open when I heard the door downstairs. If Anna was here already, I’d overslept.
“Meez Paula?” she called.
“Up here,” I mumbled. A steady rain had fallen all night and was falling now. Maybe subconsciously I knew gardening was out, so I slept in.
Still in my jammies, I made my way to the kitchen and, zombielike, started the coffee. Anna put down her voluminous handbag and her packages and just stared.
“Don’t you need to grind those beans first? Why don’t you let me do that while you get dressed?”
I yawned and nodded. Fifteen minutes later, I was back. The smell of the coffee stoked my appetite. When Anna offered me one of her four heavily buttered Portuguese rolls, I wolfed it down.
“This is delicious,” I said, mouth stuffed.
“You need to eat more. You are too skinny.”
I repeated my mantra. “I’m not, I could lose a few.”
“Says who? Some magazine?” She pushed another roll toward me, but I passed.
“When the man holds the woman, he doesn’t want to feel bones. It’s true.” She nodded sagely, and who was I to question the words of an experienced courtesan?
Revived by the caffeine, my brain was functioning again. I reached for more coffee and noticed the time on the coffeemaker-6:34.
“Anna, isn’t this a little early for you?”
“I got a ride. I was waiting for the bus in the rain, and someone offered me a lift.” She mumbled something in Spanish and looked agitated.
“Is there something you want to tell me?” I asked.
“It is nothing,” she said. Anna lifted the coffeepot and offered me more, launching into the nonstop Spanish she knew I couldn’t keep up with. One thing I was able to understand, “Boca cerrada, no entran moscas.” Loosely translated it means, “Flies can’t enter a closed mouth.” Or “keep your mouth shut.” She retreated to my office and closed the door behind her. I kept my mouth shut; maybe she and Hugo had had a spat.
With all this rain, gardening was definitely out; tramping around in the muck isn’t good for the soil, and anything planted in this goop probably wouldn’t survive. Instead, I decided to tackle a less pleasant but necessary task.
Guido Chiaramonte’s heavy machinery-the chipper and the riding mower-had already been returned, but I still had a lot of smaller items that belonged to him. Hand tools mostly-dibbles, augers, coas-many more than I had reason to own in my one-woman operation. I dreaded it, but I’d bring them back myself.
It was too early to leave for either Halcyon or Guido’s, and I’d started to regret Anna’s buttered roll, which was already settling on my hips, so I embarked on another less pleasant but necessary task-cardio. By my calculations and according to the heart- rate monitor Lucy had given me, I’d need fifty minutes on the rowing machine to work off that baby, and I dreaded it. Cardio was boring. The best experience I’d ever had on a rowing machine was the time I accidentally caught Ben-Hur on television and did my workout to the chant of ramming speed, but I didn’t own the movie and thought it unlikely I’d get lucky twice.
I bailed after thirty minutes and went a few rounds with the punching bag. The smack of leather hitting leather brought Anna out, armed with a heavy- duty stapler-God knows what damage she could inflict with that thing-but she quickly retreated when she saw it was just me and not a return visit from our prowler.
She was still sequestered in my office by the time I was ready to leave. My anorak hung over the banister. I grabbed it and my keys and yelled to her that I’d be back after lunch. I rooted through the backpack to make sure I had the cell.