Beautiful Stranger. Ruth Wind

Crystal, this is so good,” he said, putting his hand on her shoulder. The drawers had held miscellaneous kitchen junk before, which she’d sorted out and moved. From his bedroom, she’d carried all his jewelry and glass supplies, and carefully organized them by type, even fitting the drawers with cardboard dividers to keep things neat. Touched, he kissed her head. “Thank you.”

      “I know you gave up your workroom to give me a place to sleep,” she said. “This will work pretty good, don’t you think?”

      “It’ll be even better. Look how much great light there is in here.”

      “Okay.” She slapped her hands together—that’s that. “I’m going to get my sheets. Then will you show me again how to do those corners?” Now that the weather had warmed up, she loved washing the sheets and hanging them out on the line to dry.

      “Sure.” He put the groceries away, then followed her to her room when she came in with an armload of sweet-smelling linens. On her narrow twin bed, he illustrated the army corner, tight and smooth, then pulled it loose. “You try.”

      Adroitly she did it, but he saw her trouble was in the fact that she couldn’t quite bend well enough to get it tight. “Let me help, babe.”

      She straightened, laughing a little, her hand on her round belly. “It gets harder to do things, and I forget.”

      It startled him, that happy, girlish laugh, especially in reference to her pregnancy. Trying not to make too much of it, he knelt and tucked the corners tight. “I don’t want you to move anything heavy anymore, got it?”

      “Yes, sir.” She saluted.

      “You really love cleaning, don’t you?”

      “My mother thinks it’s crazy, too. She never stuck to routines—but it makes things so cheerful when they’re clean, don’t you think?” She looked around with a little smile.

      Robert straightened and looked at it through her eyes. Sunlight streamed in through the clean windows with their pressed, clean curtains. No litter of beer bottles or ashtrays sat on the coffee table, only a nice arrangement of plastic fruit that appalled him, but Crystal had picked out. She washed it every week and patted it dry.

      He’d rented the place because it was the right size for him, a little box with a kitchen and two small bedrooms and a living room that opened on to a small wooden porch. It sat at the outskirts of town, so he didn’t have to deal with neighbors much or any lawn to speak of, just the omnipresent meadowlands with their offerings of columbines and long-stalked grasses. “Yeah,” he said. “It’s a great house.”

      “You should have a cat or something.” She plumped her pillows vigorously and slid one into a crisp pillow-case.

      Aside from little requests like the feather duster she’d gone nuts for at Kmart, and the plastic fruit, it was the first time she’d even obliquely asked him for anything. “You want a cat?”

      A shrug.

      It struck him forcefully that he was no longer alone. After years and years and years of eating dinners by himself in front of the television, and getting up to everything exactly the way it had been the night before. He had somebody to talk to when he was blue. He had someone to say, “Hey, look at this,” when there was something on the news. Somebody to share chores with, eat meals with.

      He’d only done what was necessary when Crystal showed up; he’d made room for her, done the best he could. But now he realized how much she’d done for him. “Maybe we oughta go see if they have any at the pound.”

      Her face glowed. “Really?”

      “Sure.” He tugged on the end of her braid. “I like cats. Maybe we can get two, one for me and one for you.”

      “They have to be inside cats, though. No going outside. I don’t like that.”

      “Okay.” He wandered to the door, pulling his T-shirt over his head. “I’ll jump in the shower, then you can have it. Maybe we could have lunch first somewhere.”

      “McDonald’s?” she asked with hope.

      “Ugh. No. Someplace better.”

      She grinned, looking impossibly young and pretty and sweet, the way she should. “Grown-ups are so boring.”

      He tugged the rubber band out of the bottom of his braid and shook out his hair. “Look who’s talking.” He threw his T-shirt at her. “McDonald’s is not high cuisine.”

      “Yuck!” She threw the T-shirt back at him. “And don’t use such fancy language.”

      “It’s good for you.”

      The doorbell rang, and Robert picked up his shirt from the floor. “Get ready and we’ll go.” Probably the paperboy, who showed up at the dot of eleven every second Saturday. He stuck his hand in his pocket and found he only had a five. “Hang on!” he called, and went to the bedroom for a ten.

      Chapter 4

      Marissa had a routine on Saturday mornings. She liked to get up early and walk downtown, pick up a latte from a café she liked, then walk through the pleasant side streets that branched off Main, to look at garage sales. It was a homey tradition in Red Creek, a homey tradition she enjoyed right along with everyone else. She also hit the big, three-county flea market that was held at the fairgrounds once a month, and although she enjoyed the social angle as much as everyone else did, her true purpose was related to her avocation: art glass.

      She was a minor expert, specializing in Art Nouveau. She collected several items herself, and stayed in touch with an honest dealer who could sell the pieces in which she had no interest. It had amazed her at first, how often she found rare and not-so-rare pieces in Colorado, but there had been a huge amount of mining money here in Red Creek, and more in Denver. More than once she had spared a vendor from making a big mistake in selling the 1908 Van Briggle vase they’d grown tired of for two dollars and fifty cents instead of the thousands it would command in the open market, or letting the Louis Comfort Tiffany inlaid bronze dish go as an ashtray.

      This morning, she’d come out especially early, scenting possibility in an “Attic” sale on one of the oldest blocks in town. Three families had come together for the sale of an old woman’s Victorian mansion. Tables had been set out on the lawns between two houses, and Marissa browsed happily among the old records and books, tickled when she found an old, hardbound Donna Parker she remembered, the one in which Rickie’s mother died. So sad. She tucked it happily under her arm, and around the crotch of an old tree, spied the kitchen and glass-wares and costumed jewelry, all spread on a huge Arts and Crafts buffet in exquisite condition. Aha!

      Furniture wasn’t her usual area, but she examined the piece intently, trusting her instincts. It was in perfect condition, save a very small chip on one corner, and she knew it was worth far more than the fifty-dollar price tag stuck on it. She took out a notebook she carried for this purpose and scribbled notes about it for future reference. The drawers were open, holding ropes of old costume necklaces and rhinestone earrings. The top was cluttered with extraneous kitchen supplies, among them an enormous collection of vases in every shape and form available, along with plates of carnival glass—that carried price tags commensurate with its value. Marissa didn’t collect it, but was pleased to see that the sellers did know the worth.

      Most of the rest of the glass was flawed or worthless—a fairly good example of milk glass was badly cracked, and a promising cameo glass proved to be an imitation. She was about to go find one of the sellers to let them know they needed to have the buffet appraised before letting it go when her eye caught on a soft glow in one of the drawers. Hesitantly she moved a tangle of Mardi Gras beads out of the way to reveal a small, opalescent statue of a woman in a circle of glass. Marissa’s heart pinched as she reached for it, drawing it into the light—it was! She held it up to the sun, laughing at the glow it cast. It was a miraculously unchipped, uncracked and perfectly whole perfume bottle stopper by Lalique, with the design of a naked woman in a twist of