Saved by the ex-mother-in-law!

“Excuse me,” I said to the unhappy couple. “Madame is calling.” Then I moved with all speed to the opposite end of the party room.

TWENTY-FIVE

“HAVING a good time, dear?” Madame asked in a cheerful tone. Then she lowered her voice. “You looked like you needed someone to throw you a rope.”

“Yes,” I said, my stiff smile still in place, “and, as you can see, I grabbed it.”

“Well, you’re out of the hole now, Clare.” She raised a silver eyebrow. “For the moment.”

The remark was pregnant with meaning, but I wasn’t up for pursuing it. “I’d just like to get my appetite back.”

“Well, have another cocktail, dear, and you’ll be feeling far less pain. In the meantime-” She took my arm. “Let’s work the room together, shall we?”

I drained my cocktail and set it on a passing waiter’s tray. “Lay on, McDuff.”

Together we began to move around the room. I’d already said hello to many of the men who’d been at Monday’s bachelor party: Koa, the big Hawaiian Kona grower; Dexter, the Rasta-haired Caribbean coffee merchant; and Roger Mbele of Kenya ’s Nairobi Coffee Exchange.

But there were lots of others here as well, men who hadn’t been able to make Matt’s bachelor party, and some women, too, although none of us could hold a candle to Madame, whose impeccable taste had her looking as elegant as ever in a shimmering V-neck double-tiered sage dress with a matching scarf thrown over one shoulder and a long, stunning necklace of pearls threaded through delicately entwined chains of white gold.

“Who have we here…” Madame began, introducing me to a number of people from her son’s long, globe-trotting life that I’d never had the chance to meet.

First was Joao, a stout, apple-cheeked, middle-aged grower from Brazil whose teenage granddaughter was thrilled to be making her first trip to New York. Then I met a well-spoken young Costa Rican man and his bubbly sister, both with hazel eyes and beaming smiles.

Matt wandered over when he noticed us speaking with Pierre Audran, a striking Belgian blond who used to be an officer in the French Foreign Legion, and who now grew coffee in Africa. With a mental roll of the eyes, I excused myself when he and Matt started reminiscing about some wild nights they’d had a long time ago with a half-dozen half-drunk Parisian girls.

Finally, Madame presented me to a sweet Indonesian couple, who’d been providing the Village Blend with their earthy, full-bodied Sumatra for the last five years.

“We’re so happy your country is recovering after the tsunami,” I told them both.

“Yes, it was like a bad dream, a terrible dream,” Mr. Raja said. “Many were lost. We ourselves lost friends.”

“But we were lucky, too,” his wife added, touching his arm. “Our farm is on a mountain near Lake Tawar in northern Sumatra, so it was not damaged.”

“Matt tells me your farm is very beautiful. And it produces beautifully, too. That last crop was incredible-wild herbal notes, amazing complexity. Delicious.”

The couple smiled shyly and exchanged proud glances. “Thank you,” they said.

A new round of tapas was served, and my appetite was finally back-with a vengeance, unfortunately. I pretty much inhaled my small plate of ceviche de camarones (shrimp marinated in freshly squeezed lime juice served with toasted Peruvian corn and sweet potato).

The dish was stupendously refreshing but not filling enough, so I reached for the next offering: quinoa paella, a delectable version of the Spanish seafood dish. I dug in with gusto, and the rich, spicy flavors tangoed on my tongue. The real surprise, however, was the texture.

In a clever swap, the Machu Picchu chef had replaced the traditional Spanish rice with quinoa (aka Inca rice, a supernutritious grain that the people of Peru had been eating continuously for, oh, about 5,000 years). Like an al dente Italian risotto with a Spanish-Peruvian flair, the combination of crushed saffron, garlic, onion, chorizo sausage, tomatoes, green peas, and piquillo chilies steeped in fresh chicken stock suffused the clams, shrimp, and mussels with bright and piquant flavor.

“Yum-yum,” I said, absently parroting Chef Rafe Chastain’s trademark phrase. I couldn’t help thinking of the man himself, throwing punches with his tattooed arms and chasing a home invader down a Queens back street with a broken floor lamp.

Madame noticed my reverie. “Now what’s that private little smile about?”

“Nothing, really, I was just thinking that I’ll never watch Exotic Food Hunter at Large the same way again.”

“I take it you’re referring to your most recent sleuthing adventure. Matt clued me in on some of the more colorful details. You know, dear, I’m still a little peeved at you for not including me.”

Uh-oh. I’d just found the hole I was apparently not out of yet.

“I distinctly remember what you told me, Clare. There were two female detectives already on the case.”

“I certainly would have included you, Madame, but once the train started moving, there was just no turning back-”

“Excuse me,” a deep voice interrupted. “I would like to thank Matt’s mother for the very lovely lunch.”

“Javier! So nice to see you could make it to the wedding after all.”

A tall, stiffly formal man about Matt’s age took Madame’s hands and kissed her on both cheeks. His face was bronzed, and sun wrinkles framed his dark eyes. He wore his jet-black hair slicked back, and his mustache was thick and long-a very retro south of the border machismo look, which the man carried extremely well.

“Thank you for coming, Javier.” Madame turned to me. “Javier Lozado, this is my daughter-in-excuse me, my manager at the Village Blend, Clare Cosi.”

Good try, Madame, I thought. You’ll get it down sooner or later.

(Several months ago, during the planning stages of the wedding, Madame introduced me as her daughter-in-law, right in front of her future daughter-in-law, Breanne. It was a fairly awkward faux pas and did little to improve my relationship with the next Mrs. Allegro.)

Javier’s smile widened. “Ah, Ms. Cosi! You are the woman we toasted.”

“That was very nice of Matt. How do you know him, Mr. Lozado?”

“Please, call me Javier, if I may call you Clare?” he said, his crow’s feet crinkling attractively. “Matt and I met years ago. In those days, I was a coffee buyer, too.”

“You’re not a buyer any longer?” Madame said, surprised.

He shook his head. “It was too much like my career in the army. It sounds exciting and glamorous, and I confess I enjoyed it for a while. ‘A woman in every port,’ as my American friends used to say. But I soon discovered that I did so much traveling I didn’t have a home. That’s why I grow coffee now, in Colombia, the land where I was born.”

His eyes caught mine, and Javier smiled slyly. “When I long to travel or lack for feminine companionship, I explore the nightlife in a nearby city, or-excuse me, one moment-”

Javier hailed someone and gestured him forward. The short, sad-eyed man approached us. “Madame Dubois. Clare Cosi,” Javier said with great formality. “I am pleased to introduce you to my manager, Hector Pena.”

Like Javier, Pena had clearly spent hours in the scorching sun. But the older man’s deep tan didn’t appear glowing and healthy like Javier’s. His flesh almost seemed to sag, and there were dark circles under his eyes. There was an air of heaviness about the man, as if he were bearing the weight of Job on his slouching shoulders.

“I was just telling Clare it is good to get away sometimes. To travel, eh, Hector?”

Still unsmiling, Hector nodded. “I very much needed to make this journey.”

A waiter appeared with a tray of lomo saltado, a hearty meat dish that’s a favorite in Peru. Marinated strips of sirloin are sautéed with hot and sweet peppers, cilantro, garlic, and oregano. Usually served over rice and garnished with crispy French fries, the chef made the dish “hand-friendly” by skewering the beef, along with chunks of succulent peppers and a fried potato square. I took a bite of the marinated meat and slipped into a food trance. When I came out again, Hector Pena had drifted away.