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falling.
    Everything is perfect, Louis thought as he smoothed down the lapels of his red velvet smoking jacket. If only I can keep this up and pull off the big party Thursday night, then I might be able to get some rest.
    For months now, as the cost had mounted to put the restaurant together, he’d felt like the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz : too scared to sleep and afraid of witches flying overhead on a broom. For Louis they all had the faces of his investors.
    The Grant family was seated at one of the central tables. They had had the big party last night and were part of Aspen’s high society. Yvonne and Lester had two young children. For the last few years they had thrown Christmas Eve parties where the children of all their friends got to enjoy a visit with Santa Claus. Yvonne was gesturing to Louis.
    He hurried over. Yvonne was a beautiful woman, with none of the signs of fatigue that most young mothers exhibited, especially during the holidays. She looked refreshed and rested. Well, why not? Louis thought. She probably hasn’t washed a dish in ten years.
    “Louis, dear,” she said as she rested a well-manicured bejeweled hand on his arm, “I really must call my housekeeper and ask her to make extra apple pies for tonight. I forgot to tell her we invited some people to stop back again.”
    Without another word, Louis reached into his pocket and pulled out his cellular phone, a must in finer eating establishments. He flipped it open and ceremoniously handed it to her. “Madame...”
    “Thank you.” Yvonne started to press the numbers, then frowned. She turned to her husband. “Sweetie, what is our number again? I always get it mixed up with the house in Hawaii.”
    Lester took out his black book and checked. “Allow me,” he said lovingly as he took the phone from her and then handed it back.
    Yvonne smiled at her children and picked a piece of imaginary lint off her designer sleeve as she waited for Bessie to pick up the phone. “Josh, honey,” she said to her son, “why don’t you have a few more bites?”
    “I don’t want to,” the four-year-old replied.
    “Just a few itty bitty bites for Mommy?”
    “No.”
    “Okay.” Finally she spoke into the phone. “Bessie, what took you so long to answer?” Her smile quickly faded. “What are you talking about? Hold on. Lester, the Guglione painting in the library . . . did you move it?”
    “Of course not!”
    Yvonne started to hyperventilate. “Bessie went in to vacuum a few minutes ago and noticed it was gone. Nobody should have been in there last night. The children and nannies were in the family room and the rest of us were in the living-room area. Who could have taken it?” She turned to her children. “Did you see anybody go in the library?”
    Josh spoke up. “No one except Santa. He asked me and I told him there was a little bathroom in there but he might be too fat to use it.”
    “Santa!” Yvonne screeched. “He took that priceless painting! Where could he have gone with it?”
    “He said he was headed back to the North Pole,” her five-year-old daughter Julie replied practically. “It’s a long way and he had to go tinky before he left.”
    Louis felt a flash of fear sweep through his body as the other diners began to stare. What have I done? he thought.
    As they approached Sardy Field, the airport at Aspen, Regan looked out the window. What a sight to behold, she thought. The snow-blanketed Rocky Mountains surrounded them. Bold and powerful with their rugged terrain yet quietly beautiful, they seemed to welcome the plane as it began its descent.
    “Look at those evergreens,” Nora said, gesturing to the rows and rows of stately trees sweeping up the mountainsides.
    “Awesome,” Greg muttered as he peered out the window.
    “Radical,” Patrick agreed.
    “Kind of reminds me of our Christmas tree at home, huh, Mom?” Regan asked.
    “I dragged that tree over my shoulder all the way up the basement steps,” Luke