"I love Fourth of July week. All the guests are staying put, with no check-ins or check-outs," Cynthia said as she and her husband sat down to lunch. She had agreed to play pinochle with friends this afternoon, a rare indulgence. Dean looked longingly at a half-finished apple pie-set out of reach by Cynthia-while he nibbled on cold salmon and salad. A diet book was conspicuously in place on the kitchen counter. While Dean hadn't read the tome, Cynthia had utilized it faithfully in her recent perpetration of meals. So far, except for stomach growls an hour or so before mealtime, Dean wasn't complaining.
"With our little helper Maria," Cynthia continued, "for the first time in ages I feel caught up." She patted the young woman's arm.
Maria, ever smiling, joined them at the table, looking from one to the other as they spoke, understanding little but enjoying their company and thrilled with their praise. Her English vocabulary was growing a word at a time-mostly terms like dust, vacuum, linens, dishes and other domestic terminologies. She coveted each addition like an orange in a Christmas stocking. The Deans met Maria's betrothed, Emilio, who spoke halting English and was as polite as his fiancée. Maria's level of happiness rose to ecstatic when he was around.
Dean had filled his wife in on his morning's meeting while giving her a hand with the chores. She was pleased that Martha's bones now appeared to have a full name. Both wished there was a simple means of communicating this information to the child. They were also concerned over yesterday's strange call, apparently from a state worker, asking if they'd heard from the girl. While the Deans discussed contacting the state once more, both agreed another phone call would be as fruitless as earlier ones.
After Maria left to return to her duties, the pair lingered at the kitchen table. The conversation turned back to the substitution of the skeleton and the theft of the small bone from their room. Dean speculated that they might be concentrating too much on Fitzgerald and the Dawkinses, and not on others who had access to the Deans' quarters. He decided to pick Cynthia's fertile brain.
"What do we know about Westlake and Pumpkin Green, for instance?" he asked.
Cynthia thought a moment. "Mr. Westlake never married and taught high school history for thirty years. He had an interest in a plumbing supply store his brother Ralph operated. He told me about it when I photographed with him. Ralph's been dead for years and a son runs the business now. From what Fred says after snooping on the Internet, Mr. Westlake is quite wealthy. But he wasn't even in Ouray between the early 1940's, when he was a child visiting summers, and 1980, when he started coming back after his brother died."