“Mrs. Mooney has the gout. She is probably soaking in a hot bath.” Nicky stuffed the note in his jacket pocket as Rocco went off to greet more guests. “Or she got a lift to the bar at the Bangor Hotel, and she’s three Pink Squirrels shy of forgetting her name,” he mumbled to himself.
Nicky was corralled to appear in a series of group photographs with the important civic organizations and religious clubs in Roseto: the Jubilee Committee, followed by the Our Lady of Mount Carmel Sodality, Columbia Fire Company, American Legion–Martocci Capobianco Post, the Knights of Columbus, the Blue Army, the Roseto Presbyterians (long story), descendants of the town founders: the Rosato, Falcone, and Policelli families, the Pius X High School Chorus, Our Lady of Mount Carmel School science project winners, Columbus School drama club, the Roseto Coronet Band under the direction of Louis Angelini, the officers and membership of the local International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union; and the board of directors and membership of the Marconi Social Club.
By the time the group photographs were taken, every single one of the five hundred guests had appeared in at least one of them. Between set-ups, the guests managed to return to their seats to finish their plates of Beef Wellington served with green beans almondine and tossed salad, and attack the cookie trays as the coffee was served. The band, the Nite-Caps, was ready to swing.
Nicky worked his way back to the dais, his mouth watering at the thought of a hot meal. When he reached his seat, he was too late; his plate had been cleared, and the Tutololas had demolished the cookie tray. All that was left next to his nameplate was a glass of ice water and a lemon wedge. What Nicky would give for one fig cookie! And he didn’t even like them.
A dinner roll had been left on absentee Hortense’s bread plate. Nicky grabbed the roll, buttered it, and swallowed it whole; it went down like a tennis ball. Being famous meant there was never time to eat. Give me obscurity, Nicky thought as he touched his forefinger to the tip of his tongue and gathered the crumbs from the empty cookie tray, savoring a hint of the delicacies that might have been.
*
Hortense stood by the stove as Minna showed her the final step in preparing her Venetian gravy.
“You see where the sauce has thickened, and most of the liquid has burned off,” Minna said as she stirred the thick, fragrant tomato sauce. “Then I’ll make a well in the center and add a half a stick of butter, and I’ll keep stirring until the butter is mixed into the sauce completely.” She handed Hortense the spoon.
Minna drained the macaroni into the colander in the sink. “Never rinse the macaroni,” she instructed, gently shaking the noodles and setting them aside. She lifted the pan off the stove and poured some of the gravy into the serving dish. She added the macaroni on top, then ladled the rest of the gravy onto the hot pasta and mixed it together. She grated fresh Parmesan cheese on top. Minna lifted the bowl of macaroni off the counter.
“Bring the tray, please,” she said to Hortense. Her guest picked up a tray filled with crusty bread, butter, a salad of dandelion greens, black olives, and sweet onions tossed with olive oil and vinegar, and a carafe of homemade wine.
Hortense followed Minna outside to the table she had set in the garden.
“This is what it must be like in Italy,” Hortense marveled.
“Al fresco. Try the macaroni.”
Hortense sampled the dish and closed her eyes. “I’ve never tasted anything so delicious. It must be that secret ingredient.”
“It’s everything. Do you think you can make the gravy yourself?”
“I’m going to write it all down.”
“You should.”
“I’d love to make it for my next church supper.”
“Do you think they’ll like it?”
“I don’t know. The only red sauce we ever serve is barbeque, so maybe not.”
“If you love to cook, people always love to eat what you prepare.”
“That’s true. My family loves my cooking,” Hortense admitted.
“But you work in an office?”
“Yes. Pays the bills.”
“Mrs. Roosevelt must make that work interesting.”
“She does. Keeps me hopping. Do you have children, Minna?”
“One son. He lives in Albany, New York.”
“All the way up there?”
“His father-in-law has a business.”
“Your son didn’t want to stay around here?”
“His wife didn’t.”
“We lose the sons, don’t we?”
“Always. Do you have sons?”
“Two daughters. They’re grown now. I had a son too. He was born on November 5, 1916. He died the next day. I named him Malachy.”
“I’m sorry.” Minna placed her hand on Hortense’s.
“But I know about boys. I’m around them at work. I mother everyone, I guess you could say.”
“We mother the men too. I worked with my husband.”
“What did he do?”
“He had a blouse mill. Everybody around here has a blouse mill.”
“When did he pass?”
“Six years ago.”
“That’s difficult.”
“I still have a hard time with it. I went to the funeral, and then to the cemetery. I came home and haven’t left this house since.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t leave the house. I go as far as the garden and the boxwood hedge out front.”
Hortense took a sip of wine. This must have been the mental condition that Cha Cha referred to. “How do you make it?”
“I have good neighbors who shop when I need something, and the priest brings me communion. People look out for me.”
“Have you tried to go beyond your house?”
“Can’t do it. I try. I bought a ticket to the dinner tonight. When I buy it, I actually believe I’ll go. I even planned what I was going to wear. If you go up to my room, you’ll find a pale blue chiffon dress hanging on the back of the door. My good shoes are sitting on top of the box, my stockings are on the dresser. But as the time gets closer, I get more anxious. Then tonight you knocked on my door and took the burden off of me. I didn’t have to go because you arrived.”
“Can I let you in on a secret? I didn’t want to go either.”
“You must have so many events in public.”
“It gets tiresome. If I never have to appear in public again, I will be happy.”
“Of course that’s up to Mrs. Roosevelt. Hortense, if you could do it all over again, what would you do differently?”
“Everything.”
Minna laughed.
“No, I mean it. There was a lot of good in this life. But I would go a different way.”
“What do you mean?” Minna poured her guest more wine.
“I’d find my true purpose.”
“You don’t think you have?”
“I don’t.”
“That’s interesting.”
“What’s yours, Minna?”
“I’m older than you, a good twenty years, I’d say, so I’m finished searching. My purpose now is to have a peaceful end. That’s a purpose too, you know.”