A Masquerade of Muertos (Wisteria Tearoom Mysteries Book 5) Read online

  “Sorry,” he said, looking up as I came in. “I tried to be quiet.”

  “I demand compensation in the form of coffee.”

  “Help yourself. There’s pan, too, if you’re not sick of it.”

  “I have been very virtuous in refraining from gobbling pan, so I accept. What are you making? I thought people weren’t coming until one o’clock.”

  “Icing for decorating. I have to make all the colors, and put it in bags. Gonna take a while.” He gestured to a small box, which I picked up to examine. It contained a dozen different colors of professional food coloring.

  I poured myself a mug of coffee and took a pan off a tray on top of the range. The bread was warm, crusted with sugar, soft and delicious. The aroma of oranges filled my senses with each bite. I pulled tiny pieces off of the bun and nibbled them between sips of coffee, trying to make the treat last.

  Julio mixed his icing with an expert hand. Where I would have scattered powdered sugar everywhere, he kept it all confined in the bowl, gradually adding more water until he was satisfied with the consistency. He then scooped a blob of icing into a smaller bowl and reached for the box of colors.

  Having finished my pan, I washed my hands and topped up my coffee, then drifted back to the work table.

  “Can I help?”

  “Sure. You want to tint some icing?”

  “If it will save you time.”

  “It will, thanks. Have you worked with this stuff before? It’s pretty potent.”

  I nodded. “We have some toothpicks somewhere...”

  Julio produced a box and handed them to me, then scooped more icing into a separate small bowl. I chose a jar of blue coloring and opened it carefully so as not to get it on my fingers. With a toothpick, I extracted a small dab of the coloring paste and smeared it into the icing in my bowl, then used a fork to stir it in.

  We passed a contented hour mixing colors. Julio made extra purple and red, and a triple batch of black (“Goths,” he said), then started spooning the colors into small bags for piping. There were dozens by the time we had used up a third big batch of icing.

  “I think that’ll be enough,” Julio said, surveying the rows of colors. “If we start running out, I can mix up more.”

  “Were you planning to use the dining parlor?”

  Julio shook his head. “Don’t want to make a mess in there. I think we can all fit in here. There’s the break table, and the stools.”

  Four stools, to be precise, at a height for working at the work table. The break table had room for four at best.

  “How many people are coming?” I asked.

  “I’m not exactly sure, but at there’ll be least ten.”

  “It’s a pleasant day,” I said. “We could use the back portal, too. There’s the café table, and we can bring another one around from out front.”

  “Good idea! Thanks, boss!”

  We executed this plan, resulting in seating for a total of fourteen. Julio returned to the kitchen and started unloading a grocery bag, pulling out celery, carrots, and jicama.

  “No,” he said when I again offered to help. “It’s your day off. Go relax, read a book or something. Shoo.”

  It was too lovely a day for staying indoors, so I collected my garden shears, hat, and gloves and went out to deadhead the rosebushes. Leaves crunched underfoot; the cottonwoods were now dropping theirs in earnest. The wisteria leaves were falling as well.

  To my relief, the lawn showed only minimal damage from the wedding. I tidied all the roses, then the dahlias (done for the year), then the marigolds. Clipped a new handful of pansies for Violet, then grabbed a quick shower and a bite of lunch before one o’clock.

  When I heard voices below, I headed down. The smell of hot cider with cinnamon reached me on the stairs.

  Rosa and Ramon, wearing T-shirts and jeans, stood in the kitchen chatting with their cousin. Julio had set out stacks of paper plates on the work table and break table, along with platters piled with sugar skulls. Through the kitchen windows I could see a similar setup on the tables out back, with a couple of skulls weighing down each stack of plates.

  Julio offered me a paper cup of hot cider. I inhaled the steam and warmed my hands, letting it cool before risking my tongue. Plates of chips and salsa, sliced cheeses and apples, and a relish plate with dip stood on the counter. The only sweet item, and it wasn’t all that sweet, was a tray loaded with pan de muerto.

  A tall, slender blond man in a navy long-sleeved tee and khakis came in the kitchen door. It took me a second to recognize him: Julio’s roommate.

  “Andre,” I said. “Good to see you.”

  Dee arrived next, in jeans and a floppy, forest-green sweater, followed by Dale and Margo. Had Julio invited them? I watched him serve them cups of cider and decided it must have been Kris. Dale had on a dark sweater vest over a collared shirt, a touch dressy for the occasion; he must be trying to impress. Margo wore a tight-fitting black T-shirt and jeans. After introductions, they moved away and chatted together by the dish washing station. I wondered briefly if they were a couple, but the body language wasn’t there.

  At the sound of the back doorbell, I looked out the window and saw Angela Aragón in a pale yellow sweater and faded jeans. Her dark brown hair brushed her shoulders. Her expression was pensive, as mine has been in my college days. Rather than go around through the pantry to the back door, I opened the kitchen door and beckoned to her.

  “We’re all in here. Come on in!”

  Angela stepped in shyly and looked around, eyes widening. “Wow, what a huge kitchen!” She gave me smile so much like Tony’s that it made my heart jump a little.

  “Not that huge for a restaurant. Have you met my chef?” I said as Julio offered her a steaming cup of cider. “Angela, this is Julio Delgado. Angela Aragón.”

  Julio’s chin lifted slightly as a look of understanding flicked across his face, then he nodded and smiled. “Welcome,” he said.

  “So you’re the one who makes all the wonderful food here,” she said, smiling back.

  “And this is Andre,” I added. “He’s also a chef.”

  Andre shook hands with her. “Hi.”

  I introduced her to the others, then Julio called for everyone’s attention. “We might as well get started.”

  Dee, Rosa, and Ramon, who were sitting at the break table, shushed themselves and turned to listen. Julio put a skull on a paper plate, then picked up a sack of green icing and some scissors and snipped the tip off the sack.

  “Let me open these for you; it’s easy to cut off too much. Use a plate for working on. You can test the icing on the plate first, and practice designs on it.” He squeezed a green curlicue onto his plate. “Get a fresh plate for each skull; there are plenty. There are some pictures of examples on the tables. Don’t worry if you haven’t done this before—the idea is to remember the people you love who aren’t here any more. If there’s no one like that for you, just have fun.”

  Andre climbed onto a stool at the work table and took a skull from a heaping platter. Dale and Margo drifted over to the other side of the work table while Julio started snipping icing bags for the group at the break table.

  “There’s more room out back,” I said to Angela. “Shall we sit out there?”

  She nodded, smiling, and followed me outside. Just as we were settling at a cafe table, Cherie came hurrying up the driveway, her fringed purple burn-out shawl swinging with each stride. Under it she wore tight jeans and a beige camisole.

  “I’m late, sorry,” she said.

  “They’re all in the kitchen,” I told her, indicating the door.

  She hurried through it, and Angela and I seated ourselves. A breeze rustled through the trees and sent leaves drifting down.

  “I’m glad you could come,” I said. “I’ve been hoping we could get better acquainted.”

  “Me, too,” said Angela.

  I sipped my cider. “Tony says you’re artistic.”

  “Well, maybe ‘craft
y’ is a better word. I like to make things, but I’m not all that good at it.”

  “That’s just a matter of practice.”

  I picked up one of the example pages, four color photos of different skulls, each almost completely covered with intricate designs. A couple of the skulls had names on the foreheads, presumably of the honorees.

  “Wow, these are elaborate!”

  “Have you done this before?” Angela asked.

  “No. Have you?”

  “Once, in middle school art class. We used poster paints instead of icing. They kind of melted the sugar, but it was still fun.”

  I picked up a bag of pink icing, then chose a blank skull. “So, you’re in college?” I asked.

  “Community college. I’m studying nursing.”

  “What led you to that?”

  “I’m pretty sure I can get a job,” she said. “There’s a shortage.”

  “But do you like nursing?”

  She shrugged. “Beats waiting tables. Oh! I didn’t mean—”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I understand, and you’re right, waiting tables is hard work. I try to make it a good job, here, but the tearoom is a bit different from most other restaurants.”

  Angela’s cheeks were red. “I’m sorry. That was rude of me.”

  “No, it wasn’t. I’m not offended. Table service isn’t the sort of job people want to make a career of. I know that; I figure I’ll have to hire new servers every two or three years.”

  I took a swallow of cider. It was the perfect temperature. Angela followed my example, her embarrassment fading.

  The crunch of tires on gravel made me look up. Kris’s black Scion was approaching up the driveway. She parked, and she and Gabriel got out. Kris wore a loose black sweater over a burgundy broomstick skirt, and Gabriel had on a sage green shirt over stone-washed jeans, the collar open to display the silver ankh on its chain.

  “Sorry we’re late,” Kris said as they joined us.

  “It’s my fault,” Gabriel added.

  I introduced Angela and offered to fetch them some cider. As I stepped in the kitchen door, I almost collided with Julio.

  “You need icing opened,” he said, brandishing the scissors.

  “Yes. Kris and Gabriel are here. I’m getting them some cider.”

  He nodded and went out, and I headed for the slow-cooker that held the cider. At the break table, Cherie chatted happily about fashion to Dee, Ramon, and a dubious-looking Rosa. At the work table, Andre was piping orange flowers onto a skull with a swift and steady hand, while Dale squeezed out tentative blue polka dots and Margo sat frowning at a skull, a bag of black icing in one hand.

  I ladled up two cups of cider and returned to the patio table, where Angela was talking shyly with Kris while Julio snipped the tips off of icing bags. Gabriel held out a black bag to be opened, and after a couple of test squeezes onto the plate, commenced circling the eye sockets of a skull with precise lines.

  “Need anything else?” Julio asked.

  “Not now, thanks,” I said, picking up my pink icing and giving it a tentative squeeze. A thin line squiggled its way out, and I wiped it on my plate.

  Julio went back into the kitchen, and we all started decorating. This, I discovered, was trickier than it looked. My attempt to give my skull pink lips ended in its looking clownish, so I turned up the corners for a big clown smile, then piped yellow and orange flowers all over the skull, practicing until I had better control. I put two big globs of green in the eye sockets and called it done. Setting that plate aside, I took a fresh one and a second skull.

  Before I began, I glanced at what my companions were doing. Angela was making a meticulous portrait of a man, with black hair and mustache and brown eyes. Kris’s skull was an exercise in pointillism, an abstract of red and black. Gabriel’s, all in black, was an eye-buzzing striped affair that followed the contours of the skull and somehow managed to be extremely dramatic.

  Deciding to do something softer than these, I picked up a bag of lavender icing and carefully drew small flowers on the cheekbones and chin of my skull. Lack of errors built my confidence; I swapped the lavender for brown and piped curling hair around the face and over the top of the skull. It was too dark, but the color I had in mind wasn’t among our choices. I settled for piping some orange highlights over the brown, then I picked up the violet icing.

  Very carefully, I piped irises in the eyes, then eyelashes. Brown eyebrows, pink lips (successful this time), and I was nearly done. I glanced at Angela, who was gazing at her handiwork, a bag of blue in her hand. She had added “Papi” across the forehead in that color.

  Noticing my gaze, she smiled. “Blue was his favorite color. I want to put more on there but I don’t know where. I think it’s done.”

  Gabriel glanced up from his work, giving a single nod. “White space is good.”

  Gabriel had made a crisscross pattern on one skull, and now I saw it was becoming a harlequin mask with exaggerated, three-dimensional facial features. He was carefully building up layer upon layer of icing, working on other skulls while waiting for each layer to dry.

  “Gabriel, that’s amazing,” I said as I watched him apply another layer of bright green to a diamond on one cheekbone.

  “Just takes patience,” he said. “That’s ninety percent of most art.”

  “But the inspiration is the hardest part,” I said.

  “Not the hardest. Ideas are easy. Making them real...I said it took patience. I didn’t say that wasn’t hard.”

  Angela gave a tiny sigh, looking at her much simpler efforts. “Patience and talent. You have a gift.”

  “Well, he’s a professional artist,” Kris said.

  “But even that is a matter of patience,” Gabriel added. “Lots and lots of practice. Years of it.”

  Angela tilted her head. “You’re an artist, and you came here to spend your free time making folk art?”

  “To experiment. I’ve never tried this medium. And I can use these.” He gestured toward his skulls. “A seasonal display with the art I have showing. That could be fun, right?” he asked Kris.

  “Have to talk to the gallery owner, but she might go for it.”

  His answering smile was so warm, I wondered if he would actually stay with Kris. She had a solid head for business, something that could be very helpful for an artist. She was obviously fond of him, too, even if she was able to look at their relationship with cold, objective speculation. I found myself hoping Gabriel would stick around, at least for a while. Kris hadn’t confided in me, but I suspected she had been through some hard times.

  Gabriel finished the green and set the sculpted skull aside, then looked at me. “We’ll need to provide you with appropriate attire for All Hallows’ Eve. Are you and Kris about the same size?”

  “More or less,” Kris said.

  “I have a plain black dress I thought I’d wear...”

  Gabriel smiled, eyelids drooping slightly. “Plain will never do. You are like a fine gem; you deserve a setting that will complement you.” He tilted his head, as if contemplating a blank canvas.

  “I’m just going to be helping in the kitchen and the pantry,” I said, suddenly self-conscious.

  “Ah, but you are part of the masque. You must be properly dressed. Don’t worry, we can find something for you.”

  Unnerved at being the object of his artistic evaluation, I picked up my purple icing bag. To my relief, he let the subject drop.

  I glanced at Angela, wondering what she thought of this. “Are you doing anything for Halloween?”

  “I usually go over to Abuela’s and give out candy. She has trouble getting up, so it’s hard for her to answer the door, but she loves to see the kids’ costumes.”

  “Does she get a lot of trick-or-treaters?”

  “Yeah. There are bunches of kids in her building. I wear a clown nose and a rainbow wig, and a polka-dot dress. They love it!”

  I smiled, then glanced at Gabriel and Kris. They were appa
rently uninterested in trick-or-treaters and rainbow wigs. Gabriel was working on a new skull, and Kris was just finishing one.

  Angela leaned back, sipping her cider and gazing at the skull memorializing her father. Tony’s father, too. I wanted to know more about him, to ask when he had died, but that seemed intrusive. Leaving her to her thoughts, I picked up the violet icing again and contemplated my own white space.

  There was room for a name across the forehead, but I felt reluctant to do it. Instead, I gave the skull a widow’s peak in the form of a “V,” then piped an “i” below it. “Vi,” vertically, could be taken for design rather than lettering. I liked it.

  A feeling of satisfaction filled me. The skull didn’t look anything like Vi, really, but it reminded me of her. She had been pretty, ebullient, feminine. I still missed her.

  I put the icing back in the center of the table and picked up my cup. It was empty.

  “Anyone want more cider?” I asked, getting up.

  Angela nodded and handed me her cup. Kris glanced up with a quick smile and a shake of the head. Gabriel kept on working.

  “I’ll set these over here,” I told Angela, picking up her finished skull and mine of Vi. I moved them to the smaller table along with my clown skull, then took our cups into the kitchen where I walked around the tables, admiring everyone’s work.

  Dee’s skull was a study in anatomy, with vivid colors creating shadows and details, somehow making the little skull more realistic despite the rainbow hues. Rosa had covered one skull in orange and yellow flowers and was starting on a second. Ramon’s skulls reminded me of Mexican wrestling masks. Cherie’s seat was empty; maybe she’d gone to the restroom.

  A line of plates holding finished skulls sat on the counter. It was pretty easy to guess which ones were done by Julio or Andre: the works of art. The more amateur skulls were harder to peg. One was one violet and black, with flowers, dots, and crosses; another Egyptian-looking, the eyes filled in black that drew to a point at the outside edges of the face, and three black “X”s across the mouth, reminding me of the stitchings on a mummy.