R is for Ricochet (Kinsey Millhone 18)

I found a parking spot two doors away and hauled out my cleaning and the two grocery bags. My timing couldn't have been more perfect. As I pushed through my squeaky metal gate and followed the walkway around to the rear, Henry was just pulling into his two-car garage. He'd taken his bright yellow five-window Chevy coupe for its annual checkup and it was back now, the exterior polished to a fare-thee-well. The interior was probably not only spotless, but scented with faux pine. He bought the vehicle new in 1932 and he's taken such good care of it you'd swear it was still under warranty, assuming cars had warranties back then. He has a second vehicle, a station wagon he uses for routine errands and the occasional trip to the Los Angeles airport, ninety-five miles south. The coupe he reserves for special occasions, today being one.

I have trouble remembering that he's eighty-seven years old. I also have trouble describing him in terms that aren't embarrassingly laudatory given our fifty-year age difference. He's smart, sweet, sexy, trim, handsome, vigorous, and kind. In his working days, he made a living as a commercial baker, and though he's been retired now for twenty-five years, he still makes the best cinnamon rolls I've ever eaten. If I were forced to accord him a fault, I'd probably cite his caution when it comes to affairs of the heart. The only time I'd seen him smitten, he was not only deceived, but nearly taken for every cent he had. Since then, he's played his cards very close to his chest. Either he hadn't run into anyone of interest or he'd looked the other way. That is, until Mattie Halstead appeared.

Mattie was the artist-in-residence on a Caribbean cruise he and his siblings had taken in April. Soon after the cruise ended, she'd stopped in to see him on her way to Los Angeles to deliver paintings to a gallery down there. A month later, he'd made an unprecedented trip to San Francisco, where he spent an evening with her. He'd kept mum on the subject of their relationship, but I noticed he'd spiffed up his wardrobe and started lifting weights. The Pitts family (at least on Henry's mother's side) is long-lived, and he and his siblings enjoy remarkably good health. William's a bit of a hypochondriac and Charlie's almost entirely deaf, but that aside, they give the appearance of going on forever. Lewis, Charlie, and Nell live in Michigan, but there are visits back and forth, some planned and some not. William and my friend Rosie, who owns the tavern half a block away, would be celebrating their second wedding anniversary on November 28. Now it looked like Henry might be entertaining similar thoughts… or such was my hope. Other people's romances are so much less hazardous than one's own. I was looking forward to all the pleasures of true love without suffering the peril.

Henry paused when he caught sight of me, allowing me to fall into step with him as he proceeded to the house. I noticed his hair had been freshly trimmed, and he wore a blue denim work shirt with his crisply pressed chinos. He'd even traded in his usual flip-flops for a pair of deck shoes with dark socks.

I said, "Hang on a second while I drop this stuff off."

He waited while I unlocked my door and dumped my armload on the floor just inside. Nothing I'd bought would go funky in the next thirty minutes. Rejoining him, I said, "You had your hair trimmed. It looks great."

He ran a self-conscious hand across his head. "I was passing the barbershop and realized I was long overdue. You think it's too short?"

"Not at all. It shaves years off your age," I said, thinking Mattie Would have to be an idiot if she didn't understand what a treasure he was. I held open the screen door while he pulled out his keys and unlocked his back door. I followed him inside, watching as he set his groceries on the kitchen counter.

"Nice that Mattie's coming down. I'll bet you're looking forward to seeing her."

"It's only the one night."

"What's the occasion?"

"She did a painting on commission for a woman in La Jolla. She's delivering that one plus a couple more in case the woman doesn't care for the first."

"Well, it's nice she can manage a visit. When's she getting in?"

"She hoped to be here by four, depending on traffic. She said she'd check into the hotel and call once she's had a chance to freshen up. She agreed to supper here as long as I didn't go to any trouble. I said I'd keep it simple, but you know me."

He began to unload his sack: a packet wrapped in white butcher's paper, potatoes, cabbage, green onions, and a big jar of mayonnaise. While I watched, he opened the oven door and checked his crock of soldier beans bubbling away with molasses, mustard, and a chunk of salt pork. I could see two loaves of freshly baked bread resting on a rack on the counter. A chocolate layer cake sat in the middle of the kitchen table with a glass dome over it. There was also a bouquet of flowers from his garden – roses and lavender he'd arranged artfully in a china teapot.