Five Fortunes by Beth Gutcheon Read Free Book Online Page B

screamed, “he has the dog with him!” You could see the candidate’s feet beneath the curtain, and beside the feet a little dachshund gazed soulfully at the camera. Then the coverage switched to another state, and someone switched off the set.
    Outside the room, unaware of the television, Laurie and Rae stood close together.
    “Thank you,” Laurie said. “I feel better.”
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    “I’m glad,” said Rae. She looked at the younger woman a long moment. “You’re going to be fine,” she added.
    “I know.”
    “Do you?”
    Laurie looked at her. “No—no. Am I really?”
    “Yes, you are. Not as soon as you want to be. But you’re not going to cry till you blow away, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”
    Laurie nodded. That was what she was afraid of.
    Rae put a hand on her arm, and then went off toward her room, and her breakfast.
    T uesday lunch was a raucous affair served poolside, with a fashion show. A fancy shop in Santa Fe had sent the latest prêt-à-porter, plus handmade belts and scarves and jewelry from local artisans. The clothes were modeled by the Fitness Professionals, and there was lots of teasing and applause for favorite instructors. The clothes were all available for sale in the spa boutique.
    In the break between afternoon classes, when she and Rae Strouse stopped in to check out a hand-dyed silk caftan they had rather fancied, Carter Bond was astonished to learn that about $23,000
    worth of clothes had already been bought by a salty little barrel-shaped woman named Bonnie Gray. Carter had followed her around the machine circuit in weight training class that morning.
    “Yes, she does that every year,” remarked the woman who ran the shop. “She made a lot of money raising Angora goats in the Rockies.”
    “But doesn’t she live in the Rockies? On a ranch?” Carter asked.
    Bonnie had given her the impression that she spent her life in overalls, shoveling goat dung.
    “Yes, I think she does.”
    “Then, where does she wear the clothes?”
    “ ¿Quién sabe? Maybe she dresses for dinner.” Carter and Rae looked at each other.
    “I love it,” said Carter, who was used to conspicuous consumption in capital letters. Your average Beverly Hills matrons were not shy about announcing the size of their bank accounts by every kind of 43
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    semaphore known to woman, from haircut to car model. Here was little Bonnie, without a scrap of makeup or an ounce of pretension, with fingernails ragged from work, going home with a fortune in evening clothes to impress no one. “This place is like Oz. Everyone looks like a normal human, but then they turn out to have a pocketful of magic pebbles, or keys to a kingdom.”
    “There’s a reason I’ve been here twenty-two times,” said Rae.
    “I guess .”
    “I think we may need these sweaters,” Rae said, descending on a rack of colorful clothes. For an old bag, Carter noticed, Rae certainly didn’t go in for Old Bag accoutrements. Rae seized a long scarlet jacket that appeared to have been knitted of silk ribbons. She handed it to Carter.
    “No, you put it on, I can’t wear red,” said Carter.
    “Don’t be silly. Everyone can wear red.”
    Carter put it on and went to the mirror. She looked at herself as if she’d never seen this image before. She looked fabulous.
    “I think it’s particularly good with the sweatpants,” she said.
    “Got your name on it, honey. I knew it.”
    “Uh-oh, a bad thing just happened.”
    “What?”
    “I accidentally looked at the price.”
    Rae put on a jacket made of some kind of Japanese-looking silk.
    “I love that stuff, what is that?” Carter asked her.
    “Ikat, it’s called. It’s my favorite thing. Here, this is going to go nicely with your sweater.”
    She took a necklace made of large black beads cut from stone and bone, and dropped it over Carter’s head. “God wants you to wear this, that’s why She made you tall.”
    Carter went back to the mirror. She