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I followed Grandma as she made her way around the cookie table, sampling the cookies and talking to the other women. The conversation ranged from comments on the deceased’s complexion, to Melanie Glick’s divorce, to the sudden disappearance of Bubbies pickles from Dittman’s Meat Market. No one mentioned the missing keys.
We left shortly before closing and were ambushed on our way out by Barbara Rosolli.
“Edna!” she said, rushing up to Grandma. “I almost missed you. I didn’t get to talk to you at Jimmy’s wake, and I wanted to share sympathies on our loss. Just tragic.”
“He was a good man,” Grandma said.
“He was a vicious, cheating bastard,” Barbara said, “but we loved him anyway, didn’t we?”
“God don’t like when you talk ill of the dead,” Grandma said.
Barbara made the sign of the cross. “God knows what I went through with that man. I’m sure God understands when I speak candidly.”
“You got something else you want to say?” Grandma asked.
“I didn’t get a chance to drop something off for the wake, so I brought a box of cookies for you,” Barbara said, handing Grandma a cookie tin decorated with a black bow. “Better late than never, right? I baked them myself.”
“That’s real nice of you,” Grandma said. “Thank you.”
“I need to be getting home now,” Barbara said. “We should get together sometime. Have a coffee or a drink.”
“Sure,” Grandma said. “That would be okay.”
Barbara walked away, and I looked at the cookie tin Grandma was holding.
“You aren’t going to eat those, are you?” I asked.
“Heck, no,” Grandma said. “I don’t even like holding the tin. I can feel the evil burning my fingertips.”
“Is she usually friendly like that to you?”
“I wouldn’t say we were ever friendly. She moved out of the Burg after the divorce, and I didn’t see much of her. Five years ago, she bought a house next to Jeanine on Chambers Street and she started going to bingo. All she could talk about was how Jimmy’s second wife took all his money and she didn’t get any of it even though she raised their daughter. I never sat by her, so I didn’t have much to do with her. Then all of a sudden when word got out that Jimmy had died and we were married she went nuts. Emma Gorse said Barbara was going around telling everyone that I killed Jimmy for his money. She said that she had proof it wasn’t a heart attack, and that three people at the casino saw him give me the keys. Can you imagine?”
I looked over Grandma’s shoulder and saw the Rosolli sisters coming our way. Rose was leading the pack, shoulders hunched, mouth set.
“You!” she said to Grandma. “You have a lot of nerve showing your face with all these decent people.”
“They aren’t all decent,” Grandma said.
“You should get out of this community. We don’t want your kind here.”
“I’m not so bad,” Grandma said. “I’m going to take some of your brother’s money and give it to the orphaned cats and dogs. I’m thinking there’ll be a lot left over after my trip to the Galapagos Islands.”
“I thought you were going to Antarctica,” I said to Grandma.
“I’m stopping at the Galapagos on the way home,” Grandma said.
“You should burn in hell,” Rose said. “And your hair is a disgrace. You look ridiculous.”
“I’m real sorry you feel that way,” Grandma said. “I was hoping we could be civil. I even brought these cookies for you.” Grandma handed Rose the tin with the black bow. “I baked them myself.”
“Oh,” Rose said, looking at the tin. “That was nice of you. Thank you.”
“It’s a pretty tin,” Tootie said.
“We still don’t like you,” Rose said.
“We gotta go now,” Grandma said. “You girls have a good night.”
