Sunflower Street Read online

  Gigi reseated herself on the carved mahogany chair placed before a matching vanity, and looked at her nails.

  “You don’t do manicures, do you, Claire?”

  “No, sorry,” Claire said. “Just hair.”

  Claire was actually very good at nails, and did her own manicures, but she was wary of becoming Gigi’s full-time beauty consultant.

  “I’ll just have to do it myself,” Gigi sighed. “When my husband was alive, I never went down to breakfast until I was dressed in my best with perfect hair and nails.”

  “You must miss him.”

  “I do miss the social whirl,” Gigi said. “What with Eugene Senior being CEO of Pendleton General Hospital, we were out almost every night, to fundraisers, cocktail parties, formal dances, country club functions, and dinners with our gang. Most of them are dead or living in Florida now. A new generation has taken over, and they don’t have much use for an old woman like me.”

  “But you’re having lunch with friends today,” Claire said. “Who’s coming?”

  “Marigold Lawson was invited but says she has a previous engagement. I don’t blame her, really. Since the scandal she’s not seeing anyone. I feel sorry for her now that she’s dropped out of the mayoral race. It’s a pity; she could have done some real good in Rose Hill. Someone needs to chase out the riffraff and enforce some standards of appearance for people’s properties. I don’t think your friend Kay has the spleen to do it. That reminds me … excuse me a moment, won’t you?”

  Claire gathered up wet towels and tidied the en suite bathroom while Gigi made a call she couldn’t help but overhear. The two little dogs followed Claire around as she tidied, and took turns begging for treats, even though she kept telling them, “Sorry, guys, I don’t have anything.”

  “Chester,” Gigi said. “You were supposed to come up here and mow this morning. I’ve got ladies coming in two hours and the lawn is a disgrace.”

  There was a lull before Gigi spoke again.

  “I’m not paying you anything,” she said. “I’ve given you enough money this summer. Get up here in fifteen minutes or don’t bother asking me for anything ever again.”

  When Claire came back in the room, trailed by the two little dogs, Gigi’s face was flushed. She sat down at her vanity and moved some things around on the top. She picked up a bottle of perfume that Claire knew the cost of, and was impressed by. She took the stopper out and rubbed some on her wrists and behind her ears.

  “I love that scent,” Claire said.

  “It was a gift from Chip’s wife, Jillian,” Gigi said, gesturing at a photo on her vanity.

  There were several framed photos of her and her late husband, and a wedding photo of Jillian and Chip, but no photos of Eugene Junior.

  “What were we talking about?” Gigi asked as she picked up both dogs and settled them in her lap.

  Claire didn’t feel like arguing about politics with Gigi, so she focused on teasing and smoothing the hair on the crown of her head, which she then sprayed so heavily it couldn’t be moved by a gale force wind.

  “You were telling me who is coming to lunch,” Claire said.

  “Your cousin-in-law, Ava,” Gigi said. “You know she’s been seeing that man who’s buying up all the available properties in Rose Hill; he bought the old Rodefeffer glassworks and is putting a bicycle manufacturing business in there. I can’t imagine that’s a good business, but it must be. The man’s rich as Croesus and everything he touches turns to gold.”

  “I had heard that,” Claire said.

  “Is it true he rented every room in Ava’s bed and breakfast so no one else could stay there but him?” Gigi asked.

  “He has a staff,” Claire said. “He did rent the whole place, but there are more people than just him staying there. He’s staying there while he builds a house.”

  “I heard he bought everything on the other side of the Little Bear River, and he’s going to build a private bridge at the bottom of Pine Mountain Road.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Claire said.

  “He’s so unusual looking,” Gigi said. “One of those long beards all the young people are wearing nowadays, and a handlebar mustache.”

  “He seems like a nice man,” Claire said. “I’ve only met him briefly.”

  “Well, Ava certainly landed herself a live one,” Gigi said. “His father is a millionaire many times over, quite possibly a billionaire. It’s new natural gas money, of course, but it still spends, nevertheless.”

  “Who else is coming?” Claire asked.

  “Gwyneth Eldridge,” Gigi said. “She inherited family money, of course, and thousands of acres of property between here and the state park. She’s on the Eldridge College Board of Trustees. She’ll lower herself to hobnob with the other board members, but the rest of us aren’t good enough for her, so I was amazed she agreed to come.”

  Claire was well-acquainted with the snobby Gwyneth Eldridge, who was still hounding her to set up and manage a spa in the basement of the Eldridge Inn. Gwyneth just couldn’t be made to understand that waving her checkbook around like a magic wand didn’t immediately cause everyone to leap to do her bidding.

  “You know Candace, don’t you?” Gigi said. “She and her husband have built the most beautiful home out at Eldridge Point.”

  “Candy and I went to school together,” Claire said.

  “It’s Candace now, she’s quite firm about that. She’s the chair of the fundraising committee for the Children’s Hospital,” Gigi said. “She’s after me to underwrite the whole thing so they’ll put my husband’s name on it.”

  “That would be nice,” Claire said.

  “Oh, I’ll give them something,” Gigi said, “but I’m not giving them near as much as that.”

  “Giving anything is good, I guess,” Claire said.

  “This lunch is supposed to be celebrating Candace’s appointment as chair,” Gigi said, “but it’s really a way for her to ask me for the money. She needs my expertise, of course; I was chair of the same committee when we built the Cancer Center. Candace wants to cultivate Ava, now, before she marries her millionaire, so she’ll be in good after the wedding. Gwyneth will be good for a donation or to host an event in her home. Marigold can’t really afford to give anything, and she has no political clout anymore, but we felt sorry for her so we invited her just to cheer her up.”

  “Anyone else coming?”

  “My nephew’s wife, Jillian,” Gigi said with barely concealed contempt. “Do you know her?”

  “I only know Chip,” Claire said. “He was in school with us as well. Back then he was called Chippie.”

  “Small town, small world,” Gigi said. “I’m surprised you haven’t met Jillian.”

  “I can’t say that I have.”

  “Chip is a vice president and the Director of Information Systems at the hospital. My husband paid for his schooling and then created the job for him. He and Jillian are part of the new guard; Candace and Jillian are very close.”

  “I see,” Claire said.

  “Jillian’s a bit of a social climber,” Gigi said. “There’s nothing wrong with aspiring to a better social standing, of course, but I often have to remind her not to be so blatant about it.”

  “Is that everyone?” Claire asked.

  “Yes,” Gigi said. “It’s just a small gathering. I’d invite you, Claire, but you’d probably be bored by all the shop talk.”

  “I have plans,” Claire said, “but thank you for thinking of me.”

  Eugene arrived in the doorway, wheezing and red-faced, holding a large straw basket full of folded peach-colored towels. The two little dogs jumped down and ran to him, then jumped up and down, begging for his attention.

  “About time,” Gigi said. “Bunny, Chicken, stop that.”

  “I h, h, h, h, had t, t, t, t, to …”Eugene said.

  “Never mind why,” Gigi said. “Just set the basket on the bed.”

  Eugene flushed at the sight of Claire. He nodded
to her and she smiled at him, which caused him to duck his head in shyness. He set the basket on the bed, pulled an inhaler out of his pocket and used it.

  “You’ve done a wonderful job,” Gigi said to Claire, as she admired herself in the mirror.

  She opened her purse, took out her wallet, withdrew a twenty-dollar bill as if it were a hundred, and handed it to Claire. They hadn’t discussed a price, and although Claire had charged many times that when she worked in Los Angeles, she accepted the bill with grace and gratitude, and decided then and there that she wouldn’t do this again.

  “Eugene,” Gigi said, “I’m having some ladies in for lunch, so I want you to go somewhere and not come back until dinner time. Can you do that?”

  He nodded, glanced at Claire, and his face flushed again.

  “I’m also having a meeting at eleven,” Gigi said, as she looked at her watch. “You have thirty minutes to get yourself out of here, and you’re not to return until at least five o’clock. Do you understand me?”

  Eugene nodded again.

  “Good,” she said. “Now, be a good boy and walk Claire to the front door.”

  He started toward the door as Claire said, “You don’t have to do that.”

  He then stopped, unsure of whom to obey.

  “Nonsense,” Gigi said. “In this house gentlemen have manners, and Eugene will escort you to the door, shake your hand, and thank you for coming. Even he is capable of doing that much.”

  Eugene seemed to shrink into himself. Claire wanted to put an arm around him, to shield him from the contempt his mother didn’t even try to hide, and wasn’t embarrassed to display in front of someone else.

  “C’mon,” Claire said to him. “I haven’t seen your latest rocks, and I bet you have some beauties.”

  “Rocks in the basement, rocks in his head,” Gigi said. “Thanks, Claire. See you next time.”

  With a wave of dismissal, Gigi walked toward the en suite bathroom, her little dogs following along in her wake.

  Eugene fairly ran down the stairs, then remembered Claire, and waited for her, albeit without making eye contact. She didn’t really want to see the rocks, but she’d felt she wanted to say something kind to him in the face of his mother’s blatant disregard for his feelings. She followed him down the steps to the first floor, and then back through a hallway to the stairs that led to the basement.

  He looked at his watch and Claire realized he was worried about the time.

  “I’ll just take a quick look,” Claire said. “We’ll get you out of here in time.”

  The basement was dark, cool, and smelled like dryer sheets. At the bottom of the stairs Eugene flipped on bright fluorescent lights to reveal row after row of shelves, built from floor to ceiling. There was a label on each shelf with tiny, precise handwriting on them, denoting the contents of the white box on that shelf.

  “Onyx, Jasper, Coral, Lapis,” were some of the labels she read. “This is amazing.”

  When Eugene smiled this time, he forgot to hide his teeth.

  He took her on a tour. There was a packing and shipping area, with stacks of broken down white boxes of various sizes, tape, labels, a postal scale, and a neat office area with a computer. The labels were printed with “O’Hare Minerals and Gems” and their home address.

  “This is a real business,” Claire said.

  “Ith th, th, th, thertainly thomething,” Eugene said.

  “It is,” Claire said. “It’s something great.”

  Fifteen minutes later, as Claire held the next in a seemingly endless supply of polished rocks, and tried to think of a new way to say ‘this is so pretty,’ the intercom squawked and Gigi barked, “You better make tracks, young man, if you know what’s good for you.”

  Eugene, who had seemed to expand as he showed Claire his business, and had spoken with very little stuttering the whole time, shrank and trembled.

  “I have to go, anyway,” Claire said. “Thank you so much for showing me your work. It’s quite an accomplishment; you should be proud.”

  Eugene took something from a box marked “Special one-offs” and offered it to Claire.

  “I couldn’t ,” she said.

  “P, p, p, p, p, pleathe,” he said.

  Claire accepted the polished rock, which was colored teal, green, and indigo, with swirls of white. It reminded her of photos of Earth taken from space.

  “It’s beautiful, Eugene, thank you.”

  As Claire left the house, she saw a man in the driveway unloading a lawnmower from the back of a rickety pickup truck. When he saw Claire, he stopped what he was doing and leaned against the bed of the truck. He then raised his ball cap in a greeting and looked her up and down in a speculative manner.

  There was a cigarette dangling from one corner of his mouth, his raggedy pants hung low off his flat behind, and his dirty wife-beater shirt was spotted with a buffet of food stains. He took a length of pipe and a can of oil from the bed of the truck and held them up.

  “Hey, pretty lady,” he said. “How much would you charge to grease my pole?”

  Claire, who had worn her tennis shoes, took off at a trot, but was running before she got to the bottom of the driveway.

  “Can’t take a joke, huh?” he called after her. “Snotty bitch.”

  Hannah Campbell was chasing her three-year-old son, Sammy, around the outside of their three-story farm house, when the phone he had stolen from her began to play “Brown-Eyed Girl,” which was her work ringtone.

  “Sammy, dammit,” she said. “Give me that. It’s my work calling.”

  “You hafta gimme a dollar, Hannah,” he said as he ran. “You cussing.”

  He finally stopped long enough to answer the phone and Hannah caught up with him.

  “Hi,” he said into the phone. “Hannah cussing so she hafta gimme a dollar.”

  Hannah snatched the phone away.

  “Hannah Campbell, Animal Control,” she said. “How can I help you?”

  Fifteen minutes later, Hannah arrived at Gigi O’Hare’s house, and parked at the bottom of the hill, on the street. Up the hill, a multitude of people were standing on Gigi’s front steps and walkway. The driveway was full of expensive cars and SUVs parked in a line behind a catering truck.

  Hannah’s cousin-in-law, Ava, who had called her, walked down the driveway as Hannah got out of her animal control truck.

  “Thank goodness,” she said. “We can’t catch Gigi’s dogs and we’re afraid they’ll run into the road and be killed.”

  There were two tiny white dogs running in circles on the front lawn, with two women in dresses and heels trying in vain to catch them. The dogs were obviously having a great time; the women, not so much.

  “No one seems to be at home, although we have a luncheon scheduled,” Ava said.

  Hannah took a plastic baggie out of her waist pack and pulled a raw hot dog out of it. She put two fingers of one hand in her mouth and whistled, which got the dogs’ attention. She then tore off a couple of tiny pieces of the hot dog and tossed them toward the dogs.

  “Bunny! Chicken! Come and get your treats,” she called out in a high-pitched voice.

  The two little dogs made a beeline for Hannah, and two minutes later she was walking up the steps holding them.

  “Hi, Gwyneth,” Hannah said. “Hi, Candy.”

  She knew Candace and Gwyneth, and she recognized Jillian, whom she knew by sight but hadn’t formally met.

  “Thank goodness you caught them,” Jillian said. “I’m Jillian McClanahan, Mrs. O’Hare’s niece. We’re so worried about her. We were supposed to have lunch at noon, but when we arrived, the dogs were outside, and no one’s answering the doorbell. I’ve called and called, but no one answers. I’m so afraid she’s fallen and broken a hip or something.”

  Members of the catering staff were standing around on the sidewalk, holding boxes of food and equipment. Hannah handed one dog to Ava and the other to a very put-out Gwyneth Eldridge.

  “You have got to be kidding,
” Gwyneth said, as she held the small, squirming dog at arm’s length. “This is silk.”

  Hannah tried the door, which was locked. She then pulled up the doormat to reveal a key. She handed the key to Jillian, who used it to open the door.

  “Aunt Gigi,” Jillian called out.

  There was no response.

  “What should we do now?” Jillian asked Hannah.

  Hannah took the small dogs the women were holding and set them on the floor.

  “Follow them,” she said.

  The little dogs took off up the stairs, and Jillian turned to the other women.

  “Maybe I better go up first, in case Aunt Gigi’s not dressed.”

  “Knock yourself out,” Hannah said. “I’ll wait to make sure she’s all right and then I’ll be on my way.”

  The caterers passed through the waiting throng and headed back toward the kitchen. No one stopped them or suggested they wait. The remaining women tapped their feet, looked at their watches, and checked their phones for messages.

  Jillian screamed.

  Hannah bounded up the steps and followed the sound to a large bedroom. There, on the floor, was Gigi O’Hare. Her glazed eyes stared at the ceiling and her mouth hung open. Her face was blue, her lips and eyes were swollen, and there were red, raised welts on the backs of her hands. Even though there was no doubt in Hannah’s mind that she was dead, she checked for a pulse on the underside of her wrist, which was just starting to feel cool.

  The little dogs were nosing around Gigi’s body, whimpering.

  “I’m so sorry,” Hannah said to Jillian, who was hyperventilating.

  Ava arrived next, and put a consoling arm around Jillian.

  One by one, the other ladies appeared at the doorway and gasped at the scene. The little dogs curled up next to Gigi’s body and tucked their noses down between their paws.

  “Don’t come in,” Hannah warned the women. “This is a crime scene.”

  “It looks like an allergic reaction,” Ava said.

  “May God rest her soul,” Candace said.

  “Shouldn’t someone call an ambulance?” Gwyneth asked in an exasperated tone.