“You’re making me ill,” Scarpetta exclaimed.
Lucy’s laughter was loud and out of control. She held her stomach, hopping around the kitchen on one foot or the other as she howled and her aunt stirred.
“And he glued little red hots on the trees. Like ornaments. Put little stars on top. Like you get in the first grade for perfect attendance!” Lucy could barely talk, her eyes streaming as she laughed and shrieked.
Marino scowled at her.
“Everybody’s got to start somewhere,” he said.
Marino’s Cuase of Deathg Eggnog
This night he was expecting to serve three people, but it was his nature to make more of everything than was either healthy or necessary. One could look at him and deduce his modus operandi with no further evidence than his flushed face and considerable size. He began with a dozen eggs, cracking each with violence. Yokes went into the blender and whites went into a stainless steel mixing bowl. He blended the yokes and folded in a pound of powdered sugar.
Although most of the hoi polloi prefer dark rum or bourbon in their eggnog, Marino gives business to the Virginia economy and is a patron of a small family-owned distillery that makes moonshine. If you’re shopping for first-rate corn liquor, you need to consider a few points. It must be legal, the still regularly inspected by ATE It is important that copper pipes and kettles and filtered water are part of the process and that highgrade corn is used. The good stuff is rather much like combustible, mind-altering vapors. Marino likes his corn liquor in a shot glass now and then, but it is also quite compatible with eggnog and gives it a slightly different character. Marino’s eggnog is for outlaws and those who war against them. It will fire you up or shut you down. If you’re not used to it, it is not recommended unless you don’t plan to move far or quickly from one spot for at least twelve hours.
At this stage, Marino’s mixture needs to be held in custody inside the refrigerator until eggy flavors settle down and finally give in to the strong arm of alcohol. At five o’clock, while Lucy was taking her time stretching and dressing for the cold in front of the fire and Scarpetta was adding more fresh oregano to her sauce, Marino removed the blender from the refrigerator. He poured his starter eggnog into the large stainless steel bowl and with a hand mixer beat in two quarts of x~hipping cream. While Scarpetta wasn’t looking, he splashed in four more jiggers of Virginia Lightning. He returned his spirited refreshment to the refrigeratot where it would serve hard time a little longer.
An hour later Lucy was still running along West End streets and Scarpetta was taking a break, drinking hot cinnamon tea at the kitchen table. Marino whipped egg whites until they were stiff but not dry and blended peaks of them into the bowl. He added the egg mixture, constantly churning with the hand mixer until his brew was frothy. He poured a glass for Scarpetta and himself, liberally sprinkling both with cocoa powder.
“Merry Christmas,” he said, touching her glass. “Maybe next year will be better.”
“What was wrong with this one?” she wanted to know.
“I can’t believe Lucy’s out there running in the dark. You know it’s dangerous, Doc. It’s not like you got streetlights around here, and the sidewalks are all cracked up and pushed up with roots. Not to mention the way most of your neighbors drive. The little hot shot thinks nothing can hurt her.”
“And who’s talking?”
“Yeah, I’m here, aren’t I? A hell of a lot longer than she’s been.”
“I believe Lucy can take care of herself,” Scarpetta said.
Chapter 2
Lucy’s breathing was frosty blasts in perfect rhythm as she ran along Sulgrave Road in Windsor Farms, the sound of her Nikes light on pavement as she perspired in the night. Colonial lanterns and lit-up windows did not push back the darkness or show her the way, but she had run this route since high school during the many holidays and vacations spent with her aunt. After four miles Lucy was in a meditative state, her mind free to attach itself to whatever it would. This wasn’t necessarily a good thing.