Free Antiques Disposal by Barbara Allan Page B

described with considerable melodrama and great theatrics. I will spare you. Don’t say I never did anything for you.
    After the curtain had come down, a tight-lipped Peggy Sue glared at me. “Let me get this straight... . I’m lying on the floor, unconscious, bleeding to death, and you leave me to take Sushi to the vet?”
    Put that way, perhaps my actions did seem a little questionable. And even then, I’d known I would pay for it, for a long, long time.
    Still, my response was eloquent and to the point: “I ... ah ... I, uh ... I... .”
    Her chin rose. With her bandage and I.V. and nose-threaded oxygen tube, she looked like the survivor of some major disaster. “You chose a dog over me? ”
    Mother came to my defense. “Now, darling, it wasn’t at all like that. I was there tending to you. And the little doggie had been hurt.”
    An eyebrow arched—Leonard Nimoy couldn’t have done it better. “As bad as me?”
    Now I rushed to my own defense. “Hey! Sushi had stopped breathing. And, don’t forget, she got hurt protecting you!”
    â€œThere were two victims,” Mother said grandly, “and two of us. Do the math, dear!”
    Peggy Sue lowered the eyebrow. “Okay ... maybe I am being overly sensitive.”
    â€œNo, sweetheart, you just weren’t awake to understand the needs of the emergency. And Brandy only took the dog to the vet when I commanded that she do so.”
    â€œOkay,” Peggy Sue said.
    But I was clearly still in the doghouse. So to speak.
    Mother placated: “Didn’t everything turn out all right? Both you and the little doggie are going to be just fine.” She patted Peggy Sue’s shoulder. “Now, get some rest, dear—you could have an important visitor, you know, any time now!”
    â€œ Who? ” Sis and I blurted simultaneously, if with different intonations—her, interested; me, alarmed.
    What had The Madwoman of Chaillot cooked up this time?
    â€œI called Senator Clark,” Mother announced proudly. “I thought he should be aware of what transpired.”
    â€œWhat!” Sis and I said—this time we were both on the same alarmed wavelength.
    â€œMother,” I moaned. “Why did you do that? You know the election is just a few weeks away—”
    A livid Peggy Sue cut in, sitting up so straight now, she was pulling at the tubes. “What if the media finds out about our relationship? Edward might lose his seat in the Senate!”
    Mother, on the defensive, said, “I thought he had a right to know that you had been seriously injured—in light of the fact that you and he produced Brandy.”
    That sounded like I was a play.
    In a reassuring tone even I didn’t buy, I said to Sis, “Maybe he won’t come. I could try to head him off—call him right away and say you’re much better.”
    Sis glared at Mother. “ Where on earth did you get his private number?”
    Mother folded her hands. Looked at the floor. Then sneaked a glance at me.
    Eyes wide, I spread my arms. “ I didn’t give it to her! I swear . She must have gotten it off my cell phone.”
    Mother’s smile was girlish. She raised a single hand and said, “Guilty as charged.”
    â€œGet out! ” Peggy Sue shouted. “Both of you!”
    And with her I.V.-free hand, she grabbed the pillow and threw it. The thing sailed between us and plopped off the wall onto the floor.
    â€œ Out! ”
    As Mother and I beat a hasty exit, a tissue box hit me in the back. (Could have been worse—could have been a bedpan.)
    Out in the hall, Sergeant Grady gave us a quizzical look, as if we were two junior high kids who had turned up a block away from a storefront window breaking. “Everything all right, ladies?”
    â€œWhy, couldn’t be better,” Mother declared. “It would appear that our darling Peggy Sue is back to