A Deadly Vineyard Holiday Read Online Free PDF Page B

comfortable-looking woman and two teenage boys. Mom and sons were smiling, showing large teeth in equine faces. “Maggie and the boys are visiting her sister here, while I’m up here on the job. That’s Dan and that’s Milt.” He was obviously proud of his crew.
    â€œYou’re a lucky man,” said Zee enviously.
    â€œI am, and that’s a fact,” agreed Pomerlieu. “Your family is the most important thing in your life.”
    Zee took my arm. “You’re right about that.”
    An hour later, he and his people all went away.
    â€œWhat do you think?” asked Zee. “Did we pass or flunk?”
    â€œI don’t think Joan Lonergan has much confidence in us. My burglar tools and our shooting irons did not please her.”
    â€œShe’s probably just mad because I get to live with you, and she doesn’t.”
    â€œI was too modest to suggest that myself.”
    The Callahans’ decision came faster than I expected. A phone call from a happy-sounding Cricket said she was coming right after lunch.
    â€œI thought her father was famous for not making quick judgments,” I said to Zee.
    â€œSpoken like a man who has never been hounded bya teenage daughter,” said Zee. “When I think of the things I put my father through . . .” She frowned. “If Cricket plans to do anything out in public while she’s with us, we’ve got to do something about the way she looks so people won’t know who she is. I wonder . . .”
    â€œDora’s Dooz,” said my mouth, acting on its own.
    â€œDora’s Dooz?” Zee gave me a quick and none-too-kindly look. “You mean La Belle Dora, the hairdresser, your old flame? What about her?”
    Sometimes our brains are somewhere else, but our mouths are always right here. Still, I felt unjustly accused.
    â€œI didn’t know you when I dated Dora. Anyway, that was a long time ago and we’re both married now. To different people, I might add.”
    â€œI know that. What about her Dooz?”
    Dora LaBell and I had enjoyed a busy few months together during the time I’d first come down to the island to forget about my life on the Boston PD and the marriage that my police career had helped to dismember. After our heady time as a couple, both of us had gone on to other people, and Dora had opened Dora’s Dooz, a beauty salon within which I had never stepped, but which according to other women I’d come to know, was the right place to go if you wanted to become a new you.
    Dora had married Mahmud ibn Qasim, better known as Big Mike. Big Mike was a sociable guy who loved to talk. You never told him anything unless you wanted it to become public knowledge. His ancestors had once lived in the land of the five seas, but he now ran Mike’s Electric in Vineyard Haven. Big Mike’s name was an irony since he was barely as tall as his short wife, but he was fiercely proud and protective of her, making upwith passion what he lacked in stature, and he was rumored to carry a Persian dagger in his boot. Both he and Dora were, as some wag noted, small but big enough.
    â€œDora’s Dooz,” I now said. “Dora has magic hands. . . .”
    â€œHow would you know?”
    Ancient memory, in fact. But I said, “Hundreds, even thousands, maybe millions of women have told me so. Just because you never have to go to a beauty parlor doesn’t mean that other women don’t. They all say that Dora can make you over so your best friends barely recognize you. You’ve heard that yourself. Admit it.”
    â€œWell . . .”
    â€œAnd Dora’s just the opposite of Mike. She never gossips. At least, she never did when I was seeing her. She probably hears amazing things from her customers, but she never passes anything along. She keeps her mouth shut. You’ve heard that, too, haven’t you?”
    â€œWell,