Doing It at the Dixie Dew Read online

  “Cute,” Verna said, and clapped her hands. “Just cute as can be. I never thought you could do so much with paint and draping some cloth around.”

  I waited until Verna finished her cake down to the last crumb and sat sipping on her second cup of coffee. Then I pulled out the notes, unfolded them.

  Verna’s eyes grew wide and she choked a little, started to cough. Then she cried. She crumpled and uncrumpled the embroidered napkin, and fat, hot tears big as marbles rolled down her dry old creviced cheeks.

  I waited again.

  Verna took off her glasses, wiped them with the napkin, then blew her nose.

  I winced, still said nothing, but reached behind me in the kitchen for a whole box of tissues and handed them to Verna.

  “You weren’t afraid, were you?” Verna said at last.

  “Wouldn’t you be?”

  Verna looked up, her triangle of a chin quivering.

  “They were threats,” I said. “And notes that said my grandmother was murdered. Did you push her?”

  “Lord, Lord, I…” Verna’s eyes filled again. “You know better than that. I’d never lift a finger to hurt your grandmother. We’d been friends sixty years.”

  “Then why the notes?”

  “I can’t talk about it.” Verna sniffed.

  “You did write them. You don’t deny that,” I said.

  “I can’t talk about it.” Verna looked away, and the hairy mole on her cheek wiggled as if it wanted to crawl off, go somewhere on its own.

  “I think you’d better.” I was surprised I could make my voice so firm, unwavering.

  “I can’t,” Verna said, and choked a little.

  “If you can’t, who can?” I decided Verna would not leave this house until I had some answers. Some names to put with some deeds.

  “You can’t make me.” Verna played with the tissues in her lap.

  She sounded like a child. Is her mind going? I wondered. Please not now. Don’t let her click out on me. “You can tell me,” I almost whispered. “I promise I won’t tell anyone.”

  “Cross your heart? Hope to die?” Verna asked.

  “Well, no,” I said. “You can trust me without that, can’t you?”

  Verna pushed her hair back from her face with both hands, then leaned forward. “‘I’m nobody!’” Her eyes were bright as feathers.

  “Nobody?”

  “‘Who are you?’” her eyes looked blank. Was anybody still in there?

  “‘Don’t tell,’” she said. “‘They’d banish us, you know.’”

  Emily Dickinson. She’s quoting Emily Dickinson to me. Once an English major, always an English major.

  “Who is Nobody?” I asked as gently as I could, reached over to touch Verna on her arm. Bring her back to base maybe?

  “Tempie’s house is falling down, falling down, falling down,” Verna began to sing. “My fair Lavinia.” She hiccupped, put her hand over her mouth and giggled.

  “What’s Miss Lavinia got to do with all this?” I asked.

  “Why, everything,” Verna said, suddenly lucid. “I got so excited when I heard she was coming back. I wrote her right away and said come for lunch. Not Tempie, just me and Lavinia. Tempie was always so jealous, she’d just snip and snap every time she got around Lavinia.”

  I poured Verna more coffee. Let her keep talking. Truth had to be in there somewhere. Now she seemed sobering up, landing back down from whatever realm she’d spun into when I started probing.

  “Tempie always wanted what Lavinia had. She wanted what anybody else had. When your granddaddy married Miss Alice, Tempie threw a fit. Lavinia and I had a little party for her. We just knew Tempie wouldn’t come, but she did, and you know what?”

  “What?” I asked, though the last thing I wanted to hear was some social slight of fifty years ago. But the old Verna was back and I was listening.

  “You know what Tempie gave Margaret Alice at her bridal shower? Scissors,” Verna said. “And not even a coin with them to cut the bad luck. Lavinia and I gave her silver. We said that was something she could always use.”

  Let her run to the end of her thread, I thought. Maybe some of it will connect.

  “Tempie didn’t want Lavinia to come here,” Verna whispered, and looked behind her. The night stood navy blue and close against the windows.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Father Roderick, that’s why. He’d find out and Tempie would be up the creek. Up the creek.” Verna giggled.

  She’s had something to drink, I thought. Sherry. I knew Mama Alice had said something before about Verna and her “daily tipple.” I’d thought several times in the evenings Verna acted giggly. Tonight, she’d had several sherries.

  “She said Robert Redford would disappear.” Verna suddenly got serious. “She said I’d never know what happened to him.” Verna’s shoulder shook a little and she looked behind her again.

  “Did she lock him in the mausoleum?” With me? I started to add. “Was that Tempie?”

  “It wasn’t her,” Verna said. “Tempie wouldn’t do it. She loves animals. She goes to Harold’s grave every day.”

  “Who did?”

  Verna ignored her question. “Tempie said I’d never see Robert Redford again, but I did.” Verna looked quickly at me. “I didn’t know you’d be there. You found him.”

  Who? I wanted to ask. Who was she protecting? I wanted to take Verna by the shoulders and shake the answers out. The notes had been harmless. Verna hadn’t done anything except scare me, give me some sleepless nights.

  Verna sat with her eyes closed, head down now. She shredded tissue in her lap like she was making a nest for a mouse. “I’m tired. It’s late and I’m tired. I don’t want to play bridge anymore.”

  “Okay,” I said. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”

  Verna left by the back door, wobbling along the path between the magnolias. I watched her lilting walk, almost felt like going after her, offering to help her to her back door. Then I remembered Verna had written those notes. I just didn’t know why. She might be old and frail, I thought, but she’s not entirely innocent. I watched from the porch until Verna was safely inside her own house and the porch light snapped off.

  Had I really accomplished anything? I asked myself as I straightened the sunporch. Not much except I didn’t think I’d be finding any more notes. At least not anytime soon. There was something going on between Verna and Tempie. How long had it been going on and had my grandmother been caught in it?

  “You heard,” I said as Scott came in the kitchen.

  “Most of it,” he said. “And I feel better about the notes. Just don’t forget there were two murders in this town last week. One of them was in this house.”

  “I don’t need you to stay, if that’s what you’re saying,” I said. “I’ve guests. And I’ve good locks and this is still Littleboro.”

  “But not the Littleboro you knew,” he reminded me, checking the lock on the front door and turning off the porch light. “And you can’t blame a guy for giving it a shot.” He grinned. Those blue eyes almost got to me.

  “Go,” I said. Those blue eyes and that little smile pulled at me.

  “Not fair. Haven’t I been the model of decency? Haven’t I gone beyond mere mortal limitations in trying to undo the besmirched reputation of my grand gender?”

  “Go,” I said again, and opened the back door. His truck gleamed in the side driveway. “Your trusty steed awaits. It needs you.”

  “It needs gas,” he said. “And I need a whole new day to begin again the unending job of restoring this white elephant of a house for my lovely but penniless employer.” His tone was mocking, but inlaid with a hint of seriousness.

  “I need time to think and you’re not helping,” I said.

  “Will this help?” He kissed me lightly and quickly. “Good night!” he called softly, and left before I could say anything.

  I locked the door behind him. I was too tired to think beyond how much I needed a sound night’s slee
p.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Before I went to bed, I set up the sideboard with the food warmers and fixed the coffee so all I had to do in the morning was flip the switch. I put place mats out, pinched faded flowers and dead leaves from the arrangement on the sideboard. Even then, after I dimmed the lights and stood back, I decided it still looked frayed and sad. Like I felt.

  There are no rules against picking flowers at 10:00 P.M., I said to myself as I took Mama Alice’s old cutting scissors off the nail in the pantry, turned on the porch light and trekked to the yard. Besides, anything cut this late in the day was already dew drenched and would probably stay fresh indoors longer.

  I cut roses and some tall spikes from the lilac tree. I loved to mix pinks, reds and purples. The colors vibrated and gave off energy. I needed that.

  The neighborhood was quiet. A dog barked somewhere over in Queentown, the streetlights glowed and not even a car passed to break the silence. The air smelled of decayed lilacs and honeysuckle. Real spring was being brief; summer was coming in heavy with honeysuckle. I wanted to stay outside longer, to sit on the porch and just rock awhile.

  All was dark at Verna’s. Not a light burned. “Let her sleep it off,” I said. “I’m not through with her. Verna Crowell has answers and I’m going to get them if I have to pour out all her sherry and force black coffee down her gullet like stuffing a turkey.”

  Before I went in, I snipped a few sprigs of parsley from the bed Mama Alice always grew by the back door. I’d use it to garnish the scrambled eggs in the morning.

  I ran water over the parsley, turned it over and sprayed the back. In the dark, I had also cut a weed of some sort. I pulled the weed out, examined it closely. Funny, I thought, how some plants look a lot alike, cousins in the same family. We eat parsley. I held the weed up, spread its leaves. It looked like parsley, I thought, but the stem was too thick, the leaves not pointed on the ends, and it wasn’t curly at all. Nobody has probably ever tasted this homely fellow or would want to, this country cousin. I wasn’t about to taste it. Mr. Booth, my high school biology teacher who ate, slept and breathed botany, always said don’t put anything in your mouth you can’t identify first. And then only if you’re 110 percent sure it’s safe. He told them how some garden club president somewhere had used a wild plant that looked like parsley on a sandwich tray and if anyone had eaten it they would have died on the spot. “Lucky for that garden club,” he’d said, “nobody ever ate the parsley.”

  “Nobody?” I asked. One reason this parsley bed grew so well was that not only did it have a sunny and protected spot near the back door, but it was actively pruned and it stayed green and growing most of the year.

  I put the parsley in a plastic bag in the refrigerator, yawned and turned off the lights, threw the lookalike weed in the trash.

  I stood at the bottom of the stairs. The Harltons’ light under their door was out. It had been out since soon after Verna left and Scott went home.

  I closed my own bedroom door, then slid in the chain latch. I had put that on soon after opening the bed-and-breakfast. What if you hosted someone who sleepwalked? Or worse? Not likely, but it didn’t hurt to be careful.

  I was almost asleep when I remembered something about Mr. Booth’s wild-parsley story and hemlock. The deadly cousin to parsley was called water hemlock. I remembered now where we’d keyed it on our field trip … the Merritt property. The memory didn’t help me get to sleep, but when I did I dreamed of rabbits chased by poodles with red eyes and fangs. Poodles who wore jeweled collars and smiled as they danced on two legs. In the background Miss Tempie played and sang nude at a white grand piano. “‘Blest Be the Tie That Binds,’” she shrieked. The piano turned into some wheezy old pipe organ that blew up to a giant inflatable raft Verna sat on; then they floated down the river, organ, Miss Tempie and all. Verna kept giggling and waving like she was riding in a parade. Or was she crying and waving for help? I couldn’t tell. The raft was moving fast, heading toward a bridge they couldn’t go under. Bump. They bumped the bridge, the two women on the raft. I heard them bump and then I awoke. There was another bump. This one was real. Someone was in the house. My house.

  I waited. It might be one of the Harltons up for a glass of milk. If so, they’d get it and go back upstairs. I listened for the stairs to sigh. My clock glowed 3:27. Then my doorknob rattled and there was the sound of my door knob turning, metal clicking, and the door opened.

  The chain stopped it short and I sprang from the bed. “Who is it?” I called. “What do you want?”

  No one answered. In the streetlight I saw thick fingers trying to work past the chain.

  “Who is it?” I screamed again. This time I stood behind the door. I wanted to really scream, but my throat felt dry, raw and swollen shut.

  The hand turned into a fist now and hammered at the chain. Wham. Wham. Wham.

  I heard splinters. The screws were pulling loose. One more hard blow and the chain would be pulled from the wall.

  A bulky, heavy body pushed hard at the door and the chain pulled and dangled. It was held only by a bit of stubborn wood.

  I tried to push the door shut. My weight was nothing to what was on the other side. I screamed, and even to me my screams weren’t loud enough. I sounded more shrill than serious.

  “Help,” I cried. “Someone, help.”

  Whoever was on the other side whammed the door again and I tried to think of something heavy to hit him with. Knock him out. There was no way I could push a chest of drawers in front of the door, and even if I could it would only delay, not stop, whoever wanted in my bedroom. Wanted me.

  Any lamp I could reach would crumble like crackers in my hands. They were so old and fragile.

  I whirled and in the light something gleamed on my drawing table. I snatched up the X-ACTO knife, held it as if my life depended on it and began to whack at the fingers. I jabbed as hard as I could and jabbed again. Again. Blood ran from the fingers that fumbled with the chain. I jabbed harder, then deeper. I felt the knife go in the flesh and I pulled. “I’ll kill you!” I screamed. I kept screaming it, hysterically jabbing, frantic with the knife.

  Wham. The wild bear of a creature pulled back his hand. I heard heavy footsteps, the ting, ting, click of metal as he walked, then only the sound of sweet silence.

  I touched the chain. It was sticky with blood. My hand was covered with blood and shaking as I unlatched what was left of the hanging hook.

  The hall was empty and the front door hung open. I ran, slammed and locked the door, then sagged against it and cried. I sank to the floor, my back still to the door, and just cried until I felt weak and emptied. As though I’d had a fever and it had drained all my strength.

  I listened to any sounds from upstairs. Not even a snore. I remembered how Scott had said at one point all the doors at the Dixie Dew were solid wood. Not the modern doors of hollow cores. It was possible the Harltons hadn’t heard a sound.

  At the top of the stairs, the Harltons’ door remained as closed as ever. Was it possible they heard nothing? Slept though my near murder, all my screams and whoever had banged and slammed against my door? Or had they heard everything and bolted themselves in? Too terrified to come out for even a peek?

  The whole house was silent, sleeping. There seemed a peace in it. A false peace that could crack like an egg.

  I trembled, stood in the hall in my rumpled, bloodstained nightgown and tried to decide what to do. Call Scott? Call Ida Plum?

  Logic said call Ossie, report all this to Littleboro’s finest. I knew in my heart of hearts that was what any sensible person would do, but I also knew in the back of my mind I’d be the laughingstock at the barbershop or Breakfast Nook for the next week, month, even talked about as part of Littleboro lore. It would be all over town that our little miss hostess with the mostess with her silly muffins and bed-and-breakfast had called Ossie in the middle of the night on some pretext. Even though I could show him the splintered door, my nightgown stains and all, he mig
ht figure I’d done it myself to get his attention. Like I was one of those single women who lived alone and were scared of their own shadow. Would imagine Peeping Toms who were only wishful thinking, anything to get a man in uniform poking around in their bushes at night.

  * * *

  In the bathroom, I watched the red brightness of blood stain the sink, then swirl down. I took a shower. I let the tub fill with hot water, then sat in it and soaked, thinking of nothing but soap and hot water and steam and how good it felt. How good I felt to be warm and whole and alive. Oh, alive. Somehow I knew whoever it was wouldn’t come back … not tonight.

  I didn’t feel as if I could ever sleep again, but in fresh pajamas and warm from my bath I fell across my bed and slept.

  It was past seven when I woke to the sound of a key in the back door. I stiffened, listened, got ready to spring at or from whoever came through that door. For a minute it was last night all over again. I jumped from bed, dashed to hold my door shut, my hand on the blood-sticky chain latch, the other on my knife.

  “Beth?” Scott called from the hall. “What the hell happened here last night?

  I tore from my room.

  Scott grabbed and held me. “My God, this looks like blood.” He wiped at it with his finger. “Is this blood?”

  I felt the warmth of his body seeping into mine and held back my tears.

  I glanced toward the front door.

  Scott followed my look. “The blood goes that way and back here … toward this room. Are you okay?” He held me apart from him, looked closely at me, then wrapped his arms around me.

  He felt so good. Solid and good. “Someone broke in, tried to come in my bedroom.… I … I…” I couldn’t stop stuttering.

  He rubbed my arms briskly, my back, wrapped himself around me again.

  “I’m okay,” I finally said, and pulled reluctantly away. “But whoever it was is going to have one sore hand for a while.” I showed Scott the stained X-ACTO knife.

  Scott let out a whistle. “If this is what you do to gentlemen callers, remind me not to come unless I’m invited.”