“Nothing you’d be interested in,” Mother said. “Would you like some chicken soup?”
“How do you know I wouldn’t be interested?” What were they trying to hide from me? I’d actually taken a few steps toward the mysterious table when Mother’s voice stopped me.
“That’s where we put the seafood, dear. Since you seem to find it so . . . unsettling.”
I blinked in surprise. For years, Mother had treated my seafood allergy as if it were merely an inconvenient personal idiosyncrasy. She never tired of plying me with dainty morsels of substances that I knew perfectly well would give me a rash if I were foolish enough to eat them. Was she now giving up the battle? Conceding that if I was old enough to be a mother, I was old enough to know what was and wasn’t good for my body?
“Thank you,” I said, and surprised her with a brief but fierce hug.
“You’re welcome, dear,” Mother said. “Now let’s find you a quiet, comfortable place to sit while you eat.”
In a few minutes I was tucked up in an Adirondack chair with a blanket over my legs and a large box at my elbow to serve as a table.
Suddenly music blared out—a lively cheerful tune played by what sounded like a variety of flutes and trumpets accompanied by a small drum. In the open space between the chairs and the buffet, Señor Mendoza was chivvying a dozen or so people into joining hands to form a circle.
“What’s he up to?” I asked Michael.
“Teaching them the sardana,” he said. “The Catalan national dance. He thinks Ramon should add it to the play.”
When Mendoza stood in the center of the circle and demonstrated, the dance steps seemed a simple sequence of steps forward and back, left and right. Occasionally one foot would cross over the other.
Of course, when Mendoza stepped back into the circle and set his troops in motion, the simple steps he demonstrated proved far more complex for them all to execute, in unison, in time to the music.
Still, they persevered, and people began deserting the buffets and the rehearsal preparations to hover at the periphery, watching the dancers, trying out the steps themselves, and eventually joining in. A second circle was forming.
“Go try it if you like,” I said to Michael.
“Want to join me? It doesn’t look that strenuous.” He held out a hand to help me up.
“A month ago I would have,” I said. “But now I think I’d better stay in the audience. You go ahead.”
Michael seemed to get the hang of the sardana almost immediately and threw himself into it with the same enthusiasm as Señor Mendoza. Rose Noire’s sardana matched their enthusiasm, but you could tell she was merely improvising on the footwork. Mrs. Fenniman was dancing with her ancient black umbrella clutched in one hand, to the peril of anyone nearby. I had no idea whether Mother’s rendition was particularly accurate, but it was certainly elegant.
I found myself wishing Señor Mendoza would switch circles for a little while. The second circle looked a lot less authentic than the first, and whatever the ragtag third circle was doing certainly wasn’t the sardana. It looked more like a crew of inebriated morris dancers trying to perform a group tango. But maybe I was being too picky. Maybe the important thing with the sardana was not accuracy but the emotion and camaraderie of the dancers.
Perhaps a good thing I’d stayed out, then. I suddenly realized that I felt rather out of step with all these happy, energetic people. Granted none of them had any particular fondness for Dr. Wright, but did they think that made it all right for someone to murder her? Maybe they felt no guilt or sadness, but didn’t any of them feel anything? Not even a little shiver of mingled relief and melancholy at realizing that the Grim Reaper had struck so close by? Or the tiniest inkling of fear that we didn’t yet know who’d been helping the Reaper out?
But everyone certainly seemed to be having a great time, with the possible exception of Ramon, who was watching the dance with a baleful glare. Somehow I didn’t think much of Señor Mendoza’s chance of adding a sardana to the play. Or was Ramon glaring because Bronwyn had deserted him to dance with Mendoza to her left and the earnest and slightly clumsy Danny Oh on her right? Of course, Danny might not have been so clumsy if he could have taken his eyes off Bronwyn occasionally, to see where his feet were going.
And there was one other person not joining in the general gaiety: Dr. Blanco. He was sitting on one of the folding chairs, as far from the makeshift stage as possible. His elbows were on his knees, his shoulders were slumped, and he held his cell phone cradled in both hands. Now and then he glanced at it forlornly, as if waiting for a phone call that never came. Or perhaps he was using it as a clock and feeling dismayed at how slowly time was crawling by. Even though his overcoat was tightly buttoned, he looked as if he felt cold.