Nutty As a Fruitcake Read online

  “I think you mentioned it,” Judith answered tactfully. “He’d lost his job at the Boring Airplane Company.”

  “Right.” Gertrude brightened, obviously relieved to have recalled the incident. “He’d worked there for almost twenty years, but the company’s had a lot of those whatdoyacallits—cutbacks or something. He’s only fifty-seven, so he figures he’d better get another job until he can collect Social Security.”

  “Poor Art.” Judith’s voice was full of sympathy. She remembered him as a blond, good-natured kid who was just enough older to be the natural leader of the other children in the cul-de-sac. But Art had deferred the honor to Louis “Knuckles” Nordhoff, who was a year younger, but much tougher, and who had grown up in the house now occupied by the Rankerses. Art, as Judith recalled, had never been ambitious. He and his wife, JoAnne, were the parents of the grandsons Joe had seen visiting Enid and George.

  Rising from the couch, Judith patted her mother’s shoulder. “I’d better check on dinner. I’ll bring it over in a bit.”

  “A bit?” Gertrude bristled. “It’s almost five now. Why do you and lardhead have to eat supper so late? Last night it was almost six-thirty!”

  There was no point in arguing. Not about “supper,” not about the temperature of the converted toolshed, not about Joe, not about anything. Nor did Judith want to quarrel with her mother. There were worse things than being set in one’s ways. That came not only out of habit but from a desire to retain what little independence was left at Gertrude’s advanced age. Judith gave her mother a feeble, if fond, smile. There were worse things than Gertrude.

  Such as Enid Goodrich.

  TWO

  JOE’S CIGAR DIDN’T quite quench the aroma of coffee cake, fresh from the oven. Judith watched with pleasure as her guests wolfed down the warm streusel-topped slices and, in between, munched on ginger cookies. As ever, she felt a sense of satisfaction in making other people happy. The years with Dan had been an exercise in futility: She could cook and bake and roast and fry until she was exhausted, but Dan was never satiated. The hole inside her first husband had been of his own making, and nothing could fill it.

  “Okay,” said Naomi Stein, brushing a few crumbs off her chic charcoal slacks, “we’ll pretend we’ve got Hannukah lights.”

  Hamish Stein, who owned two picture-framing shops, was known as “Ham” to friends and neighbors. “Why not?” he chuckled. “We’ve always pretended to have a Hannukah bush. Any color preference for the lights?”

  Judith smiled at the Steins. “To each his—or her—own. I just want the cul-de-sac to look festive.”

  Miko Swanson sat very straight in one of the beige-and-blue side chairs. She was a tiny woman of about seventy whose beautiful skin was virtually unlined. Judith suspected, however, that the black hair was courtesy of Chez Steve’s salon.

  “I think I’d like those very small white lights. What are they called?” Her carefully tended eyebrows arched. “Fairy lights?”

  “That’s right,” Jeanne Ericson said, her dark blond page boy flipping on her shoulders as she turned to look at Mrs. Swanson. “Maybe we can do something with music. You know, Christmas tapes.” She gazed questioningly at her husband.

  Ted Ericson looked thoughtful. “Sure,” he said at last in his usual careful manner. “We could get some of those choirboy statues that light up.”

  “Dickens carolers,” his wife put in. “I like them better. The choirboys always look sort of dim.”

  Everyone laughed. Judith got up to pour more coffee and tea. Joe passed the cookie plate around. The mood was congenial, though it was clear from the start that some of the neighbors hadn’t exchanged more than casual greetings in quite a while.

  The thought was expressed aloud by Rochelle Porter, a big, hearty woman with closely cropped gray hair. “You know, it’s just a crime the way we all hole up in our houses and never really visit with each other. What’s the matter with us these days? Are we afraid? Has city life turned us into people-haters?”

  “Yes.” It was Mrs. Swanson, nodding sadly. “We watch TV and read the newspapers and fear leaving our own property. Even behind locked doors, we are afraid. No one is safe. Every day, you hear about a new violation.”

  The group grew suddenly solemn. Mrs. Swanson lowered her eyes, seemingly embarrassed by her candor. Arlene Rankers broke the uneasy silence.

  “Underwear,” she said in a clear, firm voice. The others turned to stare. “Don’t you remember? The Underwear Thief. That’s where it all started in this neighborhood. It was 1973. He was deranged.”

  Among the guests, only Mrs. Swanson and the Rankerses had resided in the cul-de-sac twenty years ago. Judith, Dan, and Mike were living in one of a series of dilapidated rentals south of the city. But Gertrude had complained loudly about the so-called underwear thief, even though she had not been a victim.

  “So he doesn’t want my bloomers,” Gertrude had said two decades earlier. “What if I sew some lace on ’em? Talk about a fancy pants!”

  The miscreant had never been caught, though it was rumored to be the somewhat fey teenaged son of the family who lived on the property now occupied by the Ericsons. Vaguely, Judith recalled that the young man eventually had become headmaster of an all-boys prep school in the East. With women’s underwear hard to find in such surroundings, Judith paled at the former neighbor lad’s possible derelictions in later years.

  “It was terrible,” Arlene went on, one hand at her breast. “We lived in constant fear. We put dead bolts on the doors. We got a watchdog, Farky. We were afraid to go to sleep at night. All I could think of was, What if some crazy pervert wants my underpants?”

  “You left them out on the back porch.” Carl Rankers’s expression was droll. “We always had a dead bolt on the front door, but you never remember to lock the back at all. And the only stranger Farky ever chased was my brother from North Dakota.”

  “Exactly!” Arlene nodded her red-gold curls with zest. “That’s what I was saying, it was a tempest in a teapot. We worry about so many things that never happen. You have to trust in the good Lord to keep you safe and let him worry about your underpants.”

  The statement was vintage Arlene, exhibiting both her good heart and her contradictory nature. Judith suppressed a smile but noted that the mood had once again lightened. Sitting on two of the dining room chairs, Rochelle and Gabe Porter had their heads together, conferring about their participation in the neighborhood decorations.

  “We’d like to go with something on the roof,” Gabe said, turning to the rest of the gathering. He was a big, dark-skinned man with glasses and a slim, trim mustache who worked as a manager for a produce wholesaler. “How about cutouts of Santa and his reindeer? My folks used to do that, and they gave us the stuff when they moved into the retirement home. I think it’s in the garage.”

  “Probably,” Arlene said with her customary candor. “Your cars certainly aren’t parked there. You’ve got them all over the street. Why don’t you decorate the hoods?”

  Fortunately, everyone laughed, especially Gabe Porter. The family owned four vehicles, including two beaters that consumed Gabe’s attention on weekends. When the Porters’ college-age daughter was home and their two married children visited, it was difficult for Judith’s guests to find parking places in the cul-de-sac. The five younger Rankerses also owned their share of rolling stock. But of course Judith would never complain: Hillside Manor’s clientele was also an imposition on the neighbors.

  “I may have to scrub and paint the figures,” Gabe was saying, in reference to Santa and his reindeer. “We’ll string some lights on the house, too.”

  Rochelle nodded. “All the colors. For Santa.”

  Naomi Stein snapped her fingers. “I’ve got it! We’ll do blue and white. That suits Hannukah better than green and red and orange.”

  Carl was watching Arlene expectantly. She sat deep in thought, with a hand under her chin. “I’d like to put the Holy Family in the front yard. We’ll get one of
those sets with everybody—the shepherds, the angels, the Wise Men, the carpet cleaners.”

  Mrs. Swanson’s fine eyebrows arched again. “Excuse me—perhaps I don’t understand all the Christmas customs even after so many years in America. But who are these carpet cleaners?”

  Carl, however, didn’t hear Mrs. Swanson. He was now looking at his wife with a mulish expression. “We don’t have room for more than Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Where do you think we’ll put a bunch of shepherds and camels and the rest of them?”

  “We can line up some of them on the front walk,” Arlene declared. “People can come in the back door.”

  Carl narrowed his blue eyes. “Why not? It’s always open. How about hanging the angels from the cedar tree?”

  “That’s wonderful!” Arlene beamed at her husband. “The camels could be coming out of the garage.”

  Seeing one of the infamous Rankers debates brewing, Judith hastily intervened: “All of you have wonderful ideas. I’m really thrilled that we’re going to do this together. Joe and I talked it over at dinner tonight, and we want to put up a miniature lighted New England village. I checked with my cousin who’s a designer, and she says we can get the pieces at a local display shop.”

  Naomi Stein and Rochelle Porter chorused their approval. Arlene cocked her head to one side. “That’s sweet, but what about the lobsters?”

  Bewildered, Judith stared. “The lobsters?”

  “You could serve them, of course. To your guests.” Arlene’s pretty face was very serious. “And the Dooleys—they shouldn’t be left out.”

  Arlene finally had a point. “They aren’t actually in the cul-de-sac,” Judith said. “I thought of asking them, but they face the other street, to the west. If we asked the Dooleys, we’d have to include the rest of the block.”

  Hamish Stein gestured with his coffee mug. “I agree. Let’s keep it among ourselves. Frankly, we don’t know the Dooleys, except by sight.”

  The large white Cape Cod inhabited by Corinne and Darren Dooley and their passel of offspring sat behind Hillside Manor and the Rankers’ house. The Dooleys were not only over-the-fence neighbors to Judith but fellow SOTS as well. Judith knew her rationale for leaving them out of the decorating scheme was logical, but she didn’t want to hurt the family’s feelings.

  “Never mind the Dooleys,” said Jeanne Ericson, who could see their Cape Cod as well as a corner of Judith’s property from her deck. “What about the Goodriches? They are part of the cul-de-sac. Is Mrs. G. too ornery to string a few lights outside?”

  “Well, no,” Judith began.

  “Hell, yes,” said Joe. “The old bat practically threw my wife out the door this afternoon.”

  Judith frowned at Joe. “That’s an exaggeration. Sort of. But she doesn’t seem inclined to take part.”

  Jeanne Ericson tossed her head, this time with disdain. “To heck with her. No wonder the kids in this neighborhood call her Mrs. Badbitch. She’s always carping about the driveway we share with them. Or else our trees are growing over into her yard. But the point is,” Jeanne went on with her usual ability to keep a discussion on course, “there are only seven houses in the cul-de-sac. It’s going to look odd if one of them is dark. I say we volunteer to decorate for the Goodriches. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy—maybe some of those Mexican lights—you know, paper bags with candles and sand inside.”

  Judith was looking dubious. “Well—George wouldn’t mind, but Enid…”

  “Jeanne’s right,” Ham interjected. “The Goodrich house will stand out like a sore thumb. People who come to see the decorations will wonder what’s going on in the neighborhood. We could get something unobtrusive, like a star or a snowman.”

  “What about a sign?” Ted Ericson suggested in his quiet manner. “A hand-lettered banner with a happy holidays wish or some similar greeting. I could ask one of our draftsmen at work to do it.” Ted’s narrow, intelligent face regarded Judith questioningly. “Would the Goodriches object to that? It wouldn’t require any work or expense on their part. We could use a simple spotlight.”

  “George wouldn’t object,” Judith answered slowly. “But Enid—well, she’s kind of crabby.”

  Arlene threw up her hands. “Kind of! When our five kids were little, there was no end to her complaints. ‘Your children tore up my tulips!’ ‘Your children threw a ball through my window!’ ‘Your children set fire to my garage!’ ‘Your children put one of the Dooleys down my chimney!’ So what, I’d tell her—at least we know where they are.” Arlene’s entire body shuddered with rekindled indignation.

  Rochelle Porter rocked back and forth on the dining room chair. “Oh, tell me about it! She was always yelling at our three kids, sometimes just for walking by her house. The woman’s a bigot. She actually called our Martin a pickaninny! Luckily, he didn’t know what she was talking about.”

  “Neither did Mrs. Goodrich,” Naomi Stein snapped. “You should hear what she called our son, Ben. He was only six the first time, and he came home crying his eyes out. Ben had never realized before that being Jewish meant being different.”

  “Mrs. Goodrich has never liked me,” Mrs. Swanson said simply. “But Mr. Goodrich, he is very kind. It must be difficult for him to live all these years with such a sour woman.”

  There was a pause, as if the entire group were paying homage to George Goodrich’s patience. Judith’s dark eyes flitted from guest to guest. Which was the most likely delegate? Enid Goodrich had criticized them all at one time or another. Her gaze finally rested on Joe. He had the shortest history in the cul-de-sac. He was a cop. He commanded respect. He was, as far as Judith was concerned, irresistible.

  “Joe, could you talk to the Goodriches tomorrow after work?”

  Clenching what was left of the cigar between his teeth, Joe grimaced at his wife. “Sure, right after I face off with a serial killer, a sex maniac, and a couple of sociopaths. Mrs. Goodrich might come as a relief. Then again, she might not.”

  Judith gave Joe an uncertain smile. He’d grumble, but he’d do it. Surely even Enid Goodrich couldn’t resist Joe’s charm. Nobody could.

  Except Gertrude.

  Judith had never driven a truck until that last day of November. Her attempt at reversing into the driveway wasn’t helped by Renie’s confused sense of direction.

  “A little more to the left…I mean, right…no, maybe you should come forward first…Look out for the mailman; he’s crossing from your place to the Ericsons’…Okay, straight back now…Ooops!”

  Judith felt the bumper hit something that she hoped wasn’t the mailman. Seeing him approach the Ericsons’ wooden gate, she let out a sigh of relief. “What did I hit?” she asked wearily.

  “Your mother,” Renie replied, rolling down the window and leaning out. “Hi, Aunt Gertrude. Are you okay?”

  “Good God almighty,” Gertrude rasped, reeling behind her walker. “Is that my idiot daughter driving a truck? What kind of a niece are you, Serena, to let that moron get behind the wheel of something bigger than my so-called apartment?”

  “It belongs to the Rankerses’ son, Kevin,” Renie shouted. “We borrowed it to pick up the New England village. He’s driving his Beamer today.” Her hand flapped at the white BMW that was parked in front of the Goodrich house. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  Gertrude snorted. “I’m fine, but my walker’s got the bends. Tell Loonyville to get out of that damned thing before she kills me.”

  Judith’s heart was racing. She couldn’t believe that she hadn’t seen her mother in the rearview mirror. Shutting off the ignition, she threw the door open and jumped down from the cab.

  “Mother! I’m sorry! I’m not used to driving a pickup and the mirror must be adjusted for…”

  “Oh, shut up!” Gertrude was scowling at her daughter. “What’s all that junk you’ve got in the back of this thing? It looks like your next guests are a bunch of pygmies.”

  Ignoring Gertrude’s protests, Judith hugged her mother. “It’s the New
England village. There’s a church, a general store, an inn, an old mill, three houses, and six people. Oh, and a bridge with a fake stream and a stone fence and a horse and buggy.”

  “You should have driven the buggy instead of that stupid truck,” Gertrude huffed. “Where are you going to put this claptrap?”

  “In the front yard,” Judith replied, feeling her nerves settle down a bit. “It’ll be wonderful. Everything lights up at night.”

  “So does your Uncle Al,” Gertrude muttered. “Who cares?”

  Judith ignored her mother’s comment. Renie had also gotten out of the pickup and was wrestling with the coach inn. Arlene and Carl Rankers were hurrying across the lawn, taking a respite from setting up their Holy Family.

  “Isn’t this fun?” Arlene enthused. “Carl has only hurt himself twice since he put the camels up.”

  Carl, in fact, wore Band-Aids on both hands and forehead. “The camels didn’t attack me,” he said dolefully. “But Arlene did. She wanted the Wise Men emerging from the hedge.”

  Arlene shot her husband a nasty look. “Oooh! Carl’s such a tease! Everybody knows the Wise Men didn’t show up at the stable until later. I thought we could put their figures in the hedge and then move them closer every day after Christmas.”

  Judith started to chime in on Carl’s behalf, but Renie was nodding sagely. “That’s true. The Wise Men didn’t arrive until the Epiphany. I like it.” She turned to Judith. “Do you remember when we were kids, and Donner & Blitzen Department Store had the big Christmas window with a series of curtains where first you saw the shepherds and then the angels and then the…”

  “It wasn’t Donner & Blitzen,” Judith interrupted. “It was The Belle Epoch, and the first thing you saw were twinkling stars and then…”

  A white Toyota Camry pulled up in the cul-de-sac, distracting Judith, who watched as it parked in front of the Ericson house. Judith recognized the car as belonging to Art Goodrich. He glanced in the direction of Hillside Manor; Judith waved. Art ambled over to the Flynns’ driveway.