Shirl opened the door for him and she was wearing the silver dress, the same one that she had been wearing that first night, with a tiny white apron tied over it. There was a silver clip holding her copper hair in place and a matching silver bracelet on her right arm, and rings on both her hands.
“Don’t get me wet,” she said, leaning over to kiss him. “I’ve got all my good things on for the party.”
“And I look like a bum,” he said, peeling off the dripping raincoat.
“Nonsense. You look like you’ve had a hard day in the office or whatever you call that place where you work. You need a party. Hang that thing in the shower and dry your hair before you catch a cold, then come into the livingroom. I have a surprise.”
“What is it?” he called after her receding back.
“If I told you it wouldn’t be a surprise,” she said with devastating female logic.
Shirl had the apron off and was waiting for him in the living room, standing proudly by the dining table. Two tall candles reflected highlights from the silverware, china plates and crystal glasses. A white tablecloth hung in thick folds. “And that’s not all,” Shirl said, pointing to the end table where the neck of a bottle projected from a silver bucket.
Andy saw that the bottle had wires over the top and around the neck, and that the bucket was full of ice cubes and water. He took out the bottle and held the label to the light so that he could read it aloud. “‘Frenchwine Champagne—a rare, selected, effervescent beverage of great vintage. Artificially colored, flavored, sweetened and carbonated.’ ” He placed it carefully back into the bucket. “We used to have wine in California when I was a kid and my father let me taste it, but I don’t remember it at all. You’re going to spoil me, Shirl, with this kind of stuff. And you were kidding me—you said that we had finished all the drink in the house—and all the time you had this tucked away.”
“I did not! I bought that today, special for this party. Mike’s liquor man came around, he’s from Jersey and didn’t even know what had happened to Mike.”
“It must have cost a fortune—”
“Not as bad as you think. I sold him back all the empty bottles and he gave me a special price. Now open it, for goodness’ sake, and let’s try it.”
Andy wrestled with the wire over the cork. He had seen them open bottles like this on TV, but it looked a lot easier than it really was. He worked it off finally and there was a satisfactory bang that shot the cork across the room, while Shirl caught the foaming wine in the glass that she held ready, just as the liquor man had instructed her.
“Here’s to us,” she said, and they raised their glasses.
“This is very good, I’ve never tasted anything like it before.”
“You’ve never tasted anything like this dinner before, either,” she said and hurried to the kitchen. “Now sit down and sip your wine and look at TV, it’ll only be a few minutes more.”
The first course was lentil soup, but with a richer and better flavor than usual. Meat stock, Shirl explained, she had saved it from the steak. There was a white sauce on the broiled tilapia, which were scattered with green flecks of cress and served with dumplings of weedcracker meal and a seacress salad. The wine went with everything and Andy was sighing with contentment and a pleasurable sense of unaccustomed fullness when Shirl brought in kofee and dessert, a flavored agar-agar gelatine with soymilk on it. He groaned, but he had no trouble eating it.
“Do you smoke tobacco?” she asked as she cleared the table.
He leaned back in the chair, eyes half closed and utterly relaxed. “Not on a cop’s salary, I don’t. Shirl, you are an absolute genius in the kitchen. I’ll be spoiled if I eat too much of your cooking.”
“Men should be spoiled, it makes them easier to live with. It’s too bad you don’t smoke, because I found two cigars left in a box that Mike had hidden away, he saved them for special guests.”
“Take them to the flea market, you’ll get a good price.”
“No, I couldn’t do that, it doesn’t seem right.”
Andy sat up. “If you want to do something, I know that Sol used to smoke, he’s the guy I told you about, who lives in the adjoining room. It might cheer him up. He’s a pretty good friend of mine.”
“That’s a wonderful idea,” she said, sensing the edge of concern in Andy’s words. Whoever this Sol was, she wanted him to like her, living right in the next room like that. “I’ll put them into my suitcase.” She carried the loaded tray into the kitchen.