Big Foot Stole My Wife Page 7

  “I do want to ask a small favor of you,” she continued with a conspiratorial wink. “I’m worried about the children damaging the house. I’m going to lock away all the good dinnerware, but they’re quite capable of leaving muddy footprints all over the furniture and handprints on the walls. I’m hoping you’ll drop by at least once a day. Just ask if they’re having a pleasant vacation or something.”

  Polly flinched. “Won’t they think I’m spying on them?”

  “That’s exactly what I want them to think. They need to be reminded they’re guests in my home.”

  “Is there anything else?”

  “One other favor. I’m going to leave a note in the car for them to come by your house to pick up the house key and letter regarding their stay. If you don’t mind, of course?”

  As dim as she was, Polly suspected the British family might be disgruntled by the time they arrived in Silver Beach. However, nothing interesting had taken place since the knifing by the clubhouse several weeks ago. Shrugging, she said, “I’ll make a point of being here when they arrive.”

  Dear Sandra,

  Welcome to Florida! I’m writing this while we pack, but I’ll try very hard not to forget anything. I hope you and the family enjoyed the flight to Orlando. I was a tiny bit muddled about the distance from the airport to the house, but George insisted that it was no more than an hour’s drive. How embarrassing to have discovered only the other day that it’s nearly three times that far! In any case, I shall assume my map and directions were clear and you successfully arrived at my dear friend Polly Simps’s house. She is excited about your visit, and will come by often to check on you.

  I must apologize for the air conditioner. The repairman has assured me that the part will arrive within a matter of days and he will be there to put it in working order. Please be very careful with the washing machine. Last night I received a nasty shock that flung me across the room and left my body throbbing most painfully. I was almost convinced my heart had received enough of a jolt to kill me! You might prefer to use the launderette in town. I had a similar experience with the dishwasher—why do these things go haywire on such short notice???

  I am so sorry to tell you that our cleaning woman was diagnosed with terminal liver cancer three days ago. She immediately left to spend her last few weeks with her family in Atlanta. Her son, who works as our gardener, went with her. I was so stricken that all I could do was offer her a generous sum and wish them both the best. The lawn mower is in the carport storage area. It’s balky, but will start with encouragement. You can buy gas (or petrol, as you say) for it at any service station.

  And now I must mention dearest Popsie, whom you’ve surely discovered by now. We’ve had him for twelve years and he’s become as beloved to us as a child. I had a long and unpleasant conversation with the brutes at the boarding kennel. They made it clear that Popsie would be treated with nothing short of cruelty. He is much too delicate to withstand such abuse and estrangement from his familiar surroundings. You will find him to be only the most minor nuisance, and I implore you to behave like decent Christians and treat him with kindness.

  He must be taken for a walk (in order to do his duty) three times a day, at eight in the morning, noon, and five in the afternoon. His feeding instructions, along with those for the vitamin and mineral supplements and details regarding his eye drops and insulin shots, are taped on the refrigerator. Once he becomes accustomed to the children, he will stop snapping and allow them to enter the bathroom. Until he does so, I strongly suggest that he be approached with caution. I should feel dreadful if dear little Dorothy’s rosy cheeks were savaged.

  The Silverado Community Beach is closed because of an overflow from a sewage disposal facility. You’ll find Miami Beach, although a bit farther, to be lovely. The presence of a lifeguard should be reassuring in that you’ve obviously neglected to teach your children how to swim. You might consider lessons in the future.

  The refrigerator has been emptied for your convenience. I left bread and eggs for your first night’s supper. Milk would have spoiled, but you’ll find a packet of powdered lemonade mix for the children. Polly will give you directions to the supermarket.

  The car started making a curious clanking sound only yesterday. I would have taken it to the garage had time permitted, but it was impossible to schedule an appointment. George suspects a problem with the transmission. I will leave the telephone numbers of several towing services should you experience any problems. All of them accept credit cards.

  But above all, make yourselves at home!

  Wilma

  Ferncliffe House

  Willow Springs Lane

  Cobbet, Lines LN2 3AB

  15 July (as they say)

  Dear Polly,

  We’re having an absolutely wonderful time. The house is much nicer than I expected. Everything works properly, and even the children’s rooms were left tidy.

  I spend a great deal of time in the garden with a cup of tea and a novel, while George pops over to the pub to shoot billiards and play darts with his cronies. Last Sunday our lovely neighbors invited us to a picnic at the local cricket field. The game itself is incredibly stupid, but I suffered through it for the sake of cucumber sandwiches and cakes with clotted cream and jam.

  I must say things are primitive. The washing machine is so small that our cleaning woman has to run it continually all three mornings every week when she’s here. Her accent is droll, to put it kindly, and she is forever fixing us mysterious yet tasty casseroles. If I knew what was in them, I doubt I could choke down a single bite. The village shops are pathetically small, poorly stocked, and close at odd hours of the day. I don’t know how these people have survived without a decent supermarket. And as for their spelling, you’d think the whole population was illiterate. I wonder if I’m the first person who’s mentioned that they drive on the wrong side of the road.

  I had reservations about the lack of air conditioning, but the days are mild and the nights cool. Sandra “conveniently” forgot to mention how often it rains; I suppose she was willing to lie simply to trick us into the exchange. She was certainly less than honest about the train ride from London. It takes a good seventy minutes.

  I’ve searched every drawer and closet in the entire house and have yet to find a Bible. It does make one wonder what kind of people they really are. In the note I left, I begged them to treat Popsie with a Christian attitude, but now I wonder if they’re even familiar with the term. Everyone is so backward in this country. For all I know, the Millingfords are Catholics—or Druids!

  I must stop now. Tonight we’re being treated to dinner at a local restaurant, where I shall become queasy just reading the menu. And I’m dreading tomorrow morning. Someone failed to shut the door of the hutch and the rabbits have escaped. No doubt the gardener will be upset in his amusing guttural way, since they were his responsibility. I honestly think it’s for the best. The animals are filthy and one of them scratched my arm so viciously that I can still see a mark. What kind of parents would allow their children to have pets like those? Dogs are so much cleaner and more intelligent. I do believe I shall leave a note to that effect for Sandra to read when the family returns home.

  Wilma

  Polly was waiting on her porch when George and Wilma pulled into the driveway. She would have preferred to cower inside her house, blinds drawn and doors locked, but she knew this would only add to Wilma’s impending fury. “Welcome home,” she called bravely.

  Wilma told George to unload the luggage, then crossed into the adjoining yard. “I feel like we’ve been traveling for days and days. It would have been so much easier to fly into the Miami airport, but the Millingfords had to go to Disneyworld, didn’t they?”

  “And they did,” Polly began, then faltered as the words seemed to stick in her mouth like cotton balls (or, perhaps, clumps of rabbit fur similar to the ones the gardener had found in the meadow behind Ferncliffe House).

  “So what?”

 
“They left two weeks ago.”

  “Just what are you saying, Polly Simps? I’m exhausted from the trip, and I have no desire to stand here while you make cryptic remarks about these whiny people. I’m not the least bit interested at the moment, although I suppose in a day or two when I’m rested you can tell me about them.” She looked back at George, who was struggling toward the house with suitcases. “Be careful! I have several jars of jam in that bag.”

  Florida was still flat, so Polly’s desperate desire to disappear into a gaping hole in the yard was foiled. “I think you’d better listen to me, Wilma. There were … some problems.”

  “I’m beginning to feel faint. If there’s something you need to say, spit it out so I can go into my own home and give Popsie the very expensive milk biscuits I bought for him in England.”

  “Come inside and I’ll fix you a glass of iced tea.”

  Wilma’s nostrils flared as if she were a winded racehorse. “All I can say is this had better be good,” she muttered as she followed her neighbor across the porch and through the living room. “Did the Millingfords snivel about everything? Are you going to present me with a list of all their petty complaints?”

  “They didn’t complain,” Polly said as she put glasses on the table. “They were a little disappointed when they arrived, I think. Five minutes after I’d given them the key and your letter, Sandra came back to ask if it was indeed the right house. I said it was. Later that afternoon David came over and asked if I could take him to the grocery store, since your car wouldn’t start.”

  “What colossal nerve! Did he think you were the local taxi service?”

  Polly shrugged. “I told him I didn’t have one, but I arranged for him to borrow Mr. Hodkins’s car for an hour. The next morning a tow truck came for the car, and within a week or so it was repaired. During that time, they stayed inside the house for the most part. At one point the two older children came to ask me about the swimming pool, but that was the last time any of them knocked on my door.”

  “I’d like to think they were brought up not to pester people all the time. But as I hinted in my letter to you, they seem to be growing up in a heathen environment. You did go over there every day, didn’t you?”

  “I tried, Wilma, but I finally stopped. I’d ring the bell and ask how they were enjoying their visit, but whichever parent opened the door just stared at me and then closed the door without saying a word. Once I heard the baby wailing in one of the bedrooms, but other than that it was so quiet over there that I wondered what on earth they were doing.”

  Wilma entertained images of primitive rituals, embellishing them with her limited knowledge of Druids and gleanings from Errol Flynn movies. “Poor Popsie,” she said at last. “How hideous for him. Did they walk him three times a day?”

  “For a few days. Then the baby had an asthma attack and had to be taken to the hospital in an ambulance. After that, they left Popsie in the backyard, where he howled all night. The misery in that dog’s voice was almost more than I could bear.”

  “Those barbarians! I’m going to write a letter to Mrs. Snooty Millingford and remind her that she was supposed to treat poor Popsie in a civilized, if not Christian, fashion. Your instincts were right, Polly. It’s very dangerous to allow foreigners in your home.”

  “There’s more. Once they got the car back, they took some day trips, but then two weeks ago they upped and left. It must have been late at night, because I never saw them loading the car and I made sure I kept an eye on them from my bedroom window during the day. Anyway, the key was in my mailbox one morning. I rushed over, but their luggage was gone. Everything was nice and neat, and they put a letter addressed to you on the kitchen counter.”

  Wilma started to comment on the unreliability of foreigners, then realized Polly was so nervous that her eyelid was twitching and her chin trembling. “What about Popsie?” she asked shrewdly, if also anxiously.

  “Gone.”

  “Gone? What do you mean?”

  “I organized a search party and we hunted for him for three days straight. I put an ad in that shopping circular and called the dog pound so many times that they promised they’d call me if they picked him up.”

  Wilma clasped the edge of the table and bared her teeth in a comical (at least from Polly’s perspective) parody of a wild beast. “They must have stolen Popsie! What did the police say? You did call the police, didn’t you? All they’d have to do is stop the car and drag those wicked Millingfords off to jail.”

  “They wouldn’t have taken him, Wilma. When the ambulance men came to the house, I heard the father say that the baby’s asthma attack was brought on by dog hairs. The last thing they’d do is put Popsie right there in the car with them and risk another attack.”

  “Well, I’m calling the police now,” Wilma snarled as she shoved back her chair and started for the front door. “And you can forget about your jar of jam, Polly Simps. I asked you to do one little favor for me. Look what I get in return!”

  George was sound asleep on the recliner as she marched through the living room, intent on the telephone in the kitchen. Of course it was too late for the police to take action. The Millingfords had safely escaped across the Atlantic Ocean, where they could ignore official demands concerning Popsie’s disappearance. She could imagine the smugness on Sandra’s face and her syrupy avowals of innocence. Perhaps she would feel differently when her children discovered the empty hutch.

  The envelope was on the counter. Wilma ripped it open, and with an unsteady hand, took out the letter.

  Dear Mrs. Chadley,

  Thank you so very much for making your home available to us this last fortnight. It was not precisely what we’d anticipated, but after a bit we accepted your invitation to “make ourselves at home.”

  Tucked under the telephone you will find invoices from the towing service, auto repair shop, and tire shop. They were all quite gracious about awaiting your payment. The chap from the air conditioner service never came. My husband called all shops listed in the back pages of the telephone directory, but none seemed to have been the one with which you trade. He tried to have a look at it himself, but became leery that he inadvertently might damage some of the rustier parts.

  After he checked the wiring, I had a go at the washing machine, but I must have done something improperly because water gushed everywhere. It made for quite a mopping.

  We’ve changed our plans and have decided to spend the remaining fortnight touring the northern part of the state. Lucinda and Charles are frightfully keen about space technology and are exceedingly eager to visit the Kennedy Center. Dorothy adores building sand castles on the beach. Also, this will make it easier for us to leave your car at the Orlando airport as we’d arranged.

  I hope you enjoyed your stay in Cobbet. Our neighbors are quite friendly in an unobtrusive way, and several of them promised to entertain you. I also hope you enjoyed Mrs. Bitney’s cooking. She is such a treasure.

  In honour of your return, I adapted one of Mrs. Bitney’s family recipes for steak and kidney pie. It’s in the freezer in an oblong pan. When you and your husband eat it, I do so hope you’ll remember our exchange.

  Yours truly,

  Sandra Millingford

  Wilma numbly put down the letter and went to the back door. Popsie’s water and food bowls were aligned neatly in one corner of the patio. A gnawed rubber ball lay in the grass. The three pages of instructions were no longer taped to the door of the refrigerator, but several cans of dog food were lined up beside the toaster.

  She went into the bathroom and peered behind the toilet as if Popsie had been hiding there all this time, too wily to show himself to Polly while he awaited their return. Not so much as a hair marred the vinyl.

  At last, when she could no longer avoid it, she returned to the kitchen and sat down. As her eyes were drawn toward the door of the freezer, they began to fill with tears.

  Sandra Millingford had made herself at home. What else had she made?

/>   All That Glitters

  Welcome to the home of Remmington Boles and his mother, Audrey Antoinette (née Tattlinger) Boles. It is a small yet gracious house in the center of the historic district. At one time it was the site of fancy luncheons and elegant dinner parties. There have been no parties of any significance since the timely and unremarkable demise of Ralph Edward Boles. I believe this was in 1962, but it may have been the following year.

  Remmington, who is called Remmie by his mother and few remaining relatives, is forty-one years old, reasonably tall, reasonably attractive. There is little else to say about his physical presence. It’s likely you would trust him on first sight. He has never been unkind to animals or children.

  Audrey is of an age that falls between sixty and seventy. She was once attractive in an antebellum sort of way. In her heyday thirty years ago, she was president of the Junior League and almost single-handedly raised the money for a children’s cancer wing at the regional hospital.

  At this moment, Audrey is in her bedroom at the top of the stairs. Although we cannot see her, we can deduce from her vaguely querulous tone that she is no longer in robust health.