“Avoiding contact with the riffraff is a major concern in Grosse Pointe.”
“All right, I said.” “Do I digress?”
“Of course you do, but I’m used to that. All right. Miss—Mrs.—Drake is a distant friend of your family’s, a lady of middle years who happens to live in the area, and this is by way of a courtesy call, right?”
Flood laughed. “She’ll love that,” he hooted. “Mrs. Drake—definitely Mrs.—made, when she was quite young, an excellent marriage and an even better divorce. She’s a lady of means now. The aunt I referred to is my father’s youngest sister, so Isabel is maybe thirty at most—hardly what you’d call ‘of middle years.’ And as far as ‘courtesy calls’ go, you’ll soon discover that the term is wildly inappropriate. Isabel Drake is probably who they had in mind when they invented the word ‘fascinating.’ ”
“Why did you call her a fallen woman?”
“That’s a tale of dark passion and illicit lust, Raphael, hardly suitable for your tender ears.”
“Try me. If there are subjects I shouldn’t talk about, I’d like to know in advance.”
“Besides which, you’re panting to hear the details, right?” Flood smirked.
“Pant, pant,” Raphael said dryly. “Get on with it, Damon. You’re going to tell me about it anyway; nothing could stop you. I could have your mouth bricked up, and you’d still tell me.”
Flood laughed. “All right, Raphael. Shortly after her divorce, Isabel conceived a passion for the husband of one of her cousins, a vapid, colorless girl of no lasting significance. There was a flaming affair which quite rapidly approached the status of a public scandal. The man in question was also of no lasting significance—some semipresentable shithead the cousin’s family had bought for her. Anyhow, there were all the usual lurid developments—gossip, people falling over themselves to tell the poor cousin what Isabel was up to. She attempted suicide, of course.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Not a bit of it. Sleeping pills, the tragic suicide note, all of it. Anyhow, there was a separation, and the poor klutz informed Isabel that he was ready to divorce the cousin and ‘make an honest woman’ of her. Isabel, who was getting bored with the whole thing at that point, laughed in his face. She was not about to give up that alimony for anybody, much less some cretin who couldn’t function outside the bedroom. He got huffy about it all and stormed out, but when he tried to go back to the cousin, she told him to buzz off. He took to drinking and made a special point of telling everyone in all the bars about Isabel’s bedroom habits—in great detail. In rime the rest of the family hinted around that they’d all be a lot happier if she’d take up residence a long, long way from Grosse Pointe, and finally she did.”
“Don’t the rich have anything better to do?”
“That’s the whole point of being rich,” Flood replied, turning off the freeway. “It leaves you free to pursue diversions other than money.”
“You know, I think you made all that up, Damon. I think you’re putting me on.”
“Would I put you on?” Flood laughed. “If you thought I’d swallow it, yes.”
The home of Isabel Drake was a chalet-style house set in a grove of fir trees near the shores of the lake. It was about ten-thirty when Flood’s small red sports car stopped on the curving gravel drive in front of the house, and morning sun filtered down through the trees with that overripe golden quality that, more than anything, speaks of autumn.
Flood bounced from the car with unusual energy, went up the wooden steps to the wide porch that stretched across the front of the house, and rang the bell. “Come along, Raphael,” he said over his shoulder.
Somewhat painfully, his muscles stiffened again from the ride, Raphael climbed from the car and started up the steps to the porch.
The docr opened, and a small woman looked out inquiringly. She was short, perhaps just over five feet tall, and she wore jeans and a loose-fitting cambric shirt of the kind Raphael had seen mill workers back home wear. Her hair was quite dark and caught at the back of her neck by a red bandanna. The skin of her face and throat was very white, and her figure under the loose shirt was full. She had a smudge of pale green paint on one cheek. “Junior,” she said in an exasperated tone. Her voice was rich and melodious. “You said noon.”
“Sorry, ‘Bel. We got away early.” He grinned down at her.
“I’m a mess,” she protested, glancing down at the front of her shirt. She was holding two long, pencillike paintbrushes in her right hand. “You always do this to me, Junior.”
“This way we get to see the real you, ‘Bel.” Flood’s grin was slightly malicious. “Let me present the Archangel Raphael,” he said, turning and beckoning.
Isabel Drake’s eyes widened, and she stared directly at Flood as if he had just said something totally unbelievable. Then she turned and looked at Raphael. Very clearly he could see a kind of stunned recognition cross her face. Her eyes seemed to cloud for a moment, and she looked as if she were about to say something. Then she shook her head slightly, and her face became a polite mask.
“Mrs. Drake,” Raphael said rather formally, inclining his head in a sort of incipient bow.
“Please,” she replied, “just ‘Bel.” She smiled up at him. Her eyes were large, and her lips sensual. “There’s no point in being formal, since Junior arranged for you to catch me in my work clothes. Is it really Raphael?”
Raphael made a face. “My mother’s idea of a joke. I’ll answer to Rafe if it’d make you more comfortable.”
“God no,” she said. “I love it. Raphael—it’s so musical.” She switched the paintbrushes and offered her hand. Raphael took it.
“Oh dear,” she said. “The paint. I completely forgot.”
Raphael looked at his hand and laughed at the smudges on his palm.
“It’s only watercolor, but I am sorry.” “It’s nothing.”
“Junior,” she said sharply, “I positively hate you for this.”
Flood, who had been watching the two of them intently, laughed sardonically.
“Come and see my little house,” she invited them. “Then I’ll get cleaned up and change.”
The interior of the chalet smelled faintly of the woman’s perfume. The walls of the living room were paneled with walnut, and there were dark, open beams at ceiling height, forming a heavy latticework overhead above which open space soared to the peaked roof. The furniture was of dark, waxed wood and leather, very masculine, which somehow seemed to accentuate Mrs. Drake’s femininity. The floor was also dark, waxed wood, and fur throw rugs lay here and there, highlighting major points in the room. The morning sun streamed through a window high in the wall above the beams, catching a heavy crystal service on a buffet in the dining area beyond the couch. The gleaming cut glass filled the room with a golden light that seemed somehow artificial, an unreal glow that left Raphael bemused, almost powerless. Here and there on the dark walls muted watercolors added that touch of something indefinable that spoke of class.
“Pretty fancy, ‘Bel.” Flood looked around approvingly.
“It’s comfortable.” She shrugged. “The kitchen’s through here.” She led them into a cheery kitchen with a round table near the broad window that faced a wooden deck that overlooked the sparkling waters of the lake. An easel was set up on the deck with a partially finished watercolor resting on it.
Raphael looked out at the painting and recognized its similarity to the ones hanging in the