His hair was blonde, flat-topped in a crew cut, and he gestured wildly with a lit cigarette. The other guy just had to be the Downtown Drug guy—not hard to pick out, as he was wearing a white pharmacist’s coat. Either he had come to the meeting directly from work, or he wore his badge of office all the time. I had a sudden, goofy mental picture of Mr. Drugstore climbing on top of his wife in bed, buck-naked under his white coat. Must have been the dope I’d smoked. He could have been a bachelor for all I knew, and the image wasn’t the kind that you’d go looking for, if you know what I mean.
“Why, hello, Polly,” a woman said as I put the coffee tray down on a side table. I turned to see a vision in pink bearing down on me from the hallway leading to the bathroom. She was about Susan’s age, dressed in what appeared to be a frilly bathrobe—all flounces, set off by a rope of pearls the size of marbles. She hugged me.
“Umm . . . hi,” I said. “How are you?”
“Who am I, you mean,” the woman said and gave a whoop of laughter. “You don’t know me from Adam, do you, dear? Never mind. I remember you when you were just a little thing. Your mother and I were great friends, and you used to come to my shop and play with the dried flowers while we had tea.”
“Oh,” I said, still completely at a loss. I was ten when my parents died, and I’ve managed to do some pretty heavy-duty forgetting since then.
“I’m Emma Tempest,” the woman said, putting me out of my misery. “I run ‘Emma’s Posies.’ Your mother was my ‘Glad Lady’.”
Another image rushed in on me like a freight train, me and my Mom in her old Mazda crammed full of fresh gladiolas as tall as I was, pink and yellow and orange, an Eden on wheels. We’d deliver them to the flower place where a nice smelling lady gave me little sugar cakes and sweet, milky nursery tea while Mom conducted business. “Well, if it isn’t the Glad Lady and her little flower girl,” she’d say.
“You’re Miss Tempest,” I said. “I haven’t thought about that in a long time.”
“Call me Emma,” she said. “It’s nice to see you grown up, dear. Now I hope you’ll follow in your mother’s footsteps and help us nail these development rascals to the wall.” Follow in my mother’s footsteps and become a fanatical religious do-gooder who never talks to her daughter and ends up getting creamed by a drunk driver on a Kuskawa back road? Not likely.
Four
Free 8 x 10 colour print with every film developed at the Kountry Pantree state-of-the-art photo lab. Why settle for less?
—A flyer delivered to every mail box in Laingford
“Did you see the superstore article in this week’s Gazette?” said Stan Herman, wrinkling his baby face in distaste. Herman was the pillowy blond person in the black T-shirt. I had been right—he was the owner of Shutterbug, the photo shop. The strategy meeting of the League for Social Justice had begun, all of us sitting in a circle in George’s living room, balancing coffee cups and napkins full of genteel nibblies on our laps.
“I think we all read it, Stan,” Aunt Susan said, “but don’t forget that the publisher is one of the store’s financial backers, at least so we’ve been told. We can’t expect him to be entirely objective.”
“It’s not Whiteside that’s the problem,” Archie Watson said. He’d been the last to arrive, still red-faced and apoplectic after his chat with Cal Grigsby at the paper. “It’s that little hack who’s working for him. He talks a smooth line, but he’s biased as hell.” He glared around the room, challenging anyone to disagree with him. His gaze lighted on me and a dangerous spark flashed in his eye, identifying me perhaps as the witness to his show of temper in the Gazette office. I smiled blandly at him, and he looked away.
“I think Cal’s very nice, Archie,” Emma Tempest said. “Granted, he made you look foolish in his article, but if you will make inflammatory statements, you can’t blame the boy for using them. He has a job to do, same as you.”
I hadn’t seen the article they were talking about. I’d meant to look at the Gazette before coming to the meeting, but I got distracted by Kountry Kow. Now I was itching to read it. I love a good bit of dirt in the local rag.
“I think we should all agree not to talk to the press individually,” said Florence Levine, the small, birdlike woman who owned the Homerun Video Den. “If we have something to say about the development, we should issue press releases.”
“That’s a good idea,” Susan said. “If we present a united front, we’ll have more clout.”
“I think this whole thing is a waste of time,” said Mr. Drugstore, who had been introduced as Joseph Olszewski. He was an older man with a baggy, basset hound face and a voice like a foghorn. I still couldn’t shake my mental image of him in bed in his white coat, except now, my wicked brain had added a long, wagging tail to the picture. Can’t say why this was. I couldn’t look at him without an inclination to snicker. “The Kountry Pantree is a done deal,” Olszewski continued. “The building’s almost finished, and if you look in the classifieds, you’ll notice they’re already advertising for staff. I don’t see what we can possibly do to stop it now.”
“We need to know who the proponents are,” Susan said. “Polly can help us with that, I think.”
“Why’s she here, anyway?” said Pete Holicky, the Pizza man. “She’s working for the enemy, isn’t she?”
“She is?” Emma Tempest said, turning to me, her face sagging in disappointment.
“I’m doing a contract for them,” I said. “And I don’t really know why I’m here. Susan asked me.”
“Polly’s an independent freelancer,” Susan said. “She’s not a supporter, per se. Are you, Polly?” Ouch. On the spot. Time for my face to go red.
“Whether I support it or not is immaterial,” I said, carefully. “I agree with Mr. Olszewski, though. I don’t think there’s much you can do at this point.”
“Ah, but we have an ace in the hole,” Emma said. “Does she know, Susan?”
“No, she doesn’t, Emma,” Susan said, “and it’s best not to tell her. As you can see, she’s an open book.” This third-person “she” stuff really bugged me, and I didn’t appreciate having my blushing mug pointed out to these people I hardly knew. Next she would be telling them that I was dating a cop and could be relied on to pass along everybody’s dirty secrets to him. I blushed harder and glanced over at George, who wasn’t saying anything. He was looking at Susan with an expression of mild amusement. You’re laughing now, I thought at him. Just wait till she blabs to everybody that you sing opera in the shower, George, and see how you like it.
“You said I could help you, Susan,” I said coldly. “Just how, exactly?”
“You met with one of their committees recently, didn’t you?” she said, ignoring my tone.
“I did,” I said.
“Well, who was there? That will give us some idea of who we’re up against.” I felt like I was in a bad spy movie. Kidnap the enemy. Feed her mini-pizzas and coffee, then make her spill the goods, boss. If she don’t talk, make her eat a cupcake.
“You
