Maine - J. Courtney Sullivan [153]
She would have to be direct, but polite. “Ann Marie, could you give us a few minutes?” she asked. The words came out sounding harsher than she’d intended.
“I’d be happy to,” Ann Marie said. “Except Connor’s eating with us and he has to get back to the church for a meeting, so—”
“Connor?” Kathleen asked.
“The priest I told you about,” Maggie said.
Oh. Well, naturally.
Maggie continued, “That’s okay, we’ll come now. We can catch up later.”
Kathleen had to fight off the feeling that her daughter wanted an out.
“Yes, sure,” she agreed. “We’ll eat fast.”
When they arrived next door, Alice was sitting at the kitchen table, smoking away, and talking to a handsome young guy in jeans.
She gave a dramatic start when she saw Kathleen standing there.
“My God, have you ever heard of a telephone?”
“Nice to see you, too, Mom.”
Her mother’s face changed, her lips curling up into a grin. Maybe she had just remembered that they had company, and male company at that.
“It’s a surprise to see you here again, that’s all. How long has it been since you were here? Five years?”
“Ten.”
She had to know that Kathleen had stayed away since Daniel died, didn’t she?
“This is Father Donnelly,” Alice said. “Meet my older daughter, Kathleen.”
He extended a hand. “It’s a pleasure.”
“Sit, sit,” Alice said, suddenly in hostess mode. “Everybody sit. Ann Marie’s made a gorgeous chicken salad.”
There was a bottle of white wine on the table. Really? They needed it at lunch?
Ann Marie held up a dusty glass jar full of red powder.
“The paprika,” she said knowingly to the priest. She began shaking it over the chicken as if it were her goal to empty the entire contents of the bottle right then and there.
“I think that’s enough, don’t you?” Alice said, looking to Maggie and raising an eyebrow in the direction of Ann Marie. “This isn’t a curry house, darling.”
Maggie laughed, and Kathleen was right back on that beach in the Bahamas, watching the two of them drinking rum, Alice trying to pull her daughter into all that Kathleen had tried to shield her from.
Alice looked Kathleen over. “You look good. You’re keeping most of the weight off, I see.”
Kathleen gritted her teeth. “Thanks.”
“I’ve already sworn off chowder for the rest of the summer myself,” Alice said, though she had never taken more than two bites of chowder in a sitting in her life. “We should probably all do that. So what on earth made you decide to come out here now? There’s only a few more days in June, you know.”
“I invited her!” Maggie said quickly, and Kathleen understood then that Maggie hadn’t told them about her situation. She felt relief for the first time in days.
Alice poured the wine. When she got to Maggie’s glass, Maggie placed her palm facedown over the top.
“Oh, right,” Alice said, and rolled her eyes. “You know, Father, this used to be a dry town. My daughter and granddaughter here would have fit right in.”
“Really?” he said. “I didn’t know that.”
“Yes! Can you imagine? Until the sixties, when you wanted to go out, you had to go to these silly Oriental tearooms. What a snooze.”
“But you managed,” Kathleen said. She turned to the priest. “She imported her whiskey from the local liquor store in Massachusetts. Until she stopped drinking herself, that is.”
Alice shot her a look, but then said, “Guilty as charged. We never had the money to go out much anyway, in those days.”
Across the table, Ann Marie began scooping the chicken salad onto the croissants. After each scoop, she slammed the heavy metal serving spoon against the china.
“Careful!” Alice said.
Ann Marie didn’t respond.
“Are you feeling all right?” Alice asked her.
“Fine. Why?”
Alice shook her head.
The priest piped up then. “There may be something Ann Marie and I should mention,” he said.
Sweet Jesus, was her sister-in-law sleeping with the priest?
“What is going on around here?” Alice said gaily, as if perhaps this was all part of some elaborate spoof. Smile! You’re on Candid Camera!
“Oh, it’s nothing,” Ann