Sinful Alibi

by Shari Hearn

  “Don’t worry, you’ll ride in it,” Marge said, grinning. “They said we could borrow it anytime.”

  “No they didn’t,” Ida Belle said.

  Marge cocked her head. “Yes they did. I said, ‘Hey, maybe we could borrow it sometime.’ They said, ‘Oh sure, anytime’ and then they laughed hysterically. But they said it. Everyone at the table was a witness. Just in case I decide to ‘borrow’ it sometime.” Marge winked.

  Ida Belle’s lip quivered as she tried to suppress a smile. “I heard you had a special guest as well for dinner tonight.”

  Gertie rolled her eyes and sighed. She opened the door and stepped inside, planting a wide, phony smile on her face. Marge and Ida Belle filed in after her. “Why look, it’s my fellow Army gals, Ida Belle and Marge. This is Gill Girard. He analyzes animal droppings for a living.” Gertie cast a stern look toward Marge, who screwed up her face to keep in a laugh. She turned back to Gill and yawned. “I hope you don’t mind, but we have some girl stuff to discuss.”

  Gill stood from the sofa. “Oh, I should be getting back to Lake Charles anyway. I have an early day tomorrow. I need to collect some possum samples before the sun dries them out.”

  “Oh no, you wouldn’t want that stuff all dried out.” Gertie rushed to him and hooked her arm through his, escorting him to the door and nudging him over the threshold. “You have a nice drive home.”

  Gertie shut the door.

  “Gertie!” her mother said. “That was plain rude.”

  “Not as rude as ruining my first dinner back from Vietnam by talking about bear poop. Even Granny couldn’t take it and snuck out to go play Canasta.”

  “Your daddy and I thought it was very educational.” Mom sighed. “I’m just trying to help you transition back to civilian life. It’s been a while since you’ve been part of the dating scene.”

  Gertie rolled her eyes. “Mama, there were plenty of men around in Vietnam. Honestly, you act like we all went off to a convent.”

  Marge grabbed a pecan bar from Mrs. Hebert’s plate. “That’s right, Gertie dated plenty.”

  “And then some,” Ida Belle said under her breath as she removed a cookie from the plate as well.

  Apparently, Beatrice Hebert’s hearing hadn’t diminished over the years like her taste in men had. Her eyebrows shot upward. “Gertie!” Mom was a big believer in I do before and then some. “I should ground you!”

  “I’m almost thirty, Mama!”

  Mom folded her arms. “And I’m still your mother. It’s a mother’s job to help guide her daughter.” She eyed Marge’s cutoffs that showed way more thigh than was typical within the city limits, then gazed at Ida Belle’s floral bell bottoms and Gertie’s tie-dyed slacks that stretched tightly around her butt and flared out at the bottom. “Honestly. Hot pants? Bell bottoms? And I don’t know what the heck you call those obscene things you’re wearing.”

  “Hip huggers,” Gertie said proudly. And she was very proud of them, indeed. They were the newest thing in women’s fashion. If her mama thought Gertie was returning to that square, frumpy girl of old, she had another thing coming.

  Mom shook her head. “Your privates ought to be kept private.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with my pants,” Gertie said. “They’re what’s in style.”

  “For hippies, maybe. This is Sinful. We are God-fearing people, not Mary Ann smoking hippies!”

  Gertie sighed. “It’s called Mary Jane.”

  Mrs. Hebert’s face fell. “Dear lord, you know the real name for it. I think I need to consult with the man upstairs about this.” She turned and shot into the kitchen.

  “I haven’t smoked it, Mama!” Gertie called out after her. “But you’re gonna drive me to it if you try to fix me up with any more men who look like cartoon characters! The least you could have done was try to set me up with someone who looked like GI Joe and not a know-it-all chipmunk!”

  “She’s going to go blab to your dad?” Marge asked.

  Gertie shook her head. “She was referring to Jesus.”

  “I think Jesus is pretty wise to your dating life,” Ida Belle said, licking the cookie crumbs from her fingers.

  “And then some,” Marge said.

  They headed up the stairs. “My mom’s driving me crazy,” Gertie said. “I’ve been back less than a day and she’s trying to plan my life. You should see the clothes she sewed for me and left in my closet. Plaid Bermuda shorts that go to my knees!”

  Marge shook her head. “It was bad enough my mom tried to set me up, but I can’t believe she tried to marry off Ida Belle as well.”

  Gertie nodded. “Especially since Walter’s already claimed her.”

  Ida Belle shot her head toward Gertie. “What?”

  “Claimed?” Marge said. “I can’t believe that word came out of your mouth.”

  Ida Belle opened her mouth to speak, but Gertie cut her off. “You’re right. One day around my mama has me going back to the Stone Age. I meant, they’re an item.”

  Ida Belle held her hand up. “Excuse me. I’m right here. And Walter hasn’t claimed me, and we are not an item. And I see that look between you two, but we’re just friends, that’s all. Besides, he’s been out of the Marines and back home for six months. I’m sure he’s been dating lots of women.”

  “Does he know we’re home?”

  Ida Belle nodded. “He had to travel to Baton Rouge on some kind of business thing, but we plan on having dinner together when he gets back in a couple of days.”

  “He told her he had a big surprise he wanted to show her,” Marge added. “I think it’s an engagement ring.”

  Ida Belle shook her head. “He knows better than that. I’ve had that conversation with him. I’m not the marrying kind.” Though she tried to hide it, Gertie couldn’t help noticing her friend’s eyes light up when she talked about him. She could deny her feelings for Walter all she wanted, but the eyes never lied.

  “And your dad?” Gertie asked. “When are you going to see him?”

  Ida Belle frowned. “I haven’t decided yet.” She never tried to hide her feelings about her dad. Their relationship had been strained ever since her mother died when she was in first grade. Her dad had wanted a boy and never let her forget it. Every time the three came home on leave, Ida Belle would stay with Marge’s or Gertie’s families, sometimes with Marge’s Aunt Louanne. If it ever bothered her father, he never let her know.

  They came to Gertie’s room. She stopped and placed her hand on the doorknob. “Oh, prepare yourselves. Mama did a little redecorating.”

  Gertie pushed open the door and heard audible gasps from her two friends.

  Ida Belle snickered as she took in the room. “Holy crap.”

  It was as if they’d stepped back in time. Posters of teen heart throbs of the fifties lined the walls. A poodle skirt hung like a museum piece. Stuffed animals were poised on the bed.

  Gertie nodded sadly. “Uh, huh. Mama thought it would be fun to take all my old mementos out of storage and torture me with them. She calls it, ‘Gertie through the ages.’”

  Marge walked over to the posters and examined them. “Is this Fabian?”

  Gertie grunted an affirmation.

  Marge shook her head as she looked at another poster, which was plastered with lipstick imprints. “I forgot how much you liked Roy Rogers.”

  Ida Belle picked up a doll from a shelf. “Is this your old Betsy Wetsy?”

  Gertie nodded sadly. “Be careful with that.”

  Ida Belle held the baby doll away from her body, a huge wet spot appearing on her blouse. “Damn thing peed on me!”

  Gertie rushed over and took Betsy from her, shoving it back on the shelf. “Mama made sure she was filled with water before I got home. Thought I’d get a kick out of it. I didn’t.”

  Marge collapsed on the bed, her body convulsing in laughter.

  “I’m so glad you find this funny, Marge,” she said, kicking the side of the bed.

  Marge sat upright and
wiped tears from her eyes. “You’re right, it’s not funny.” She glanced over at the wet spot on Ida Belle’s blouse. Her body shook as she held in the laughter.

  Ida Belle sighed. “This is not a former spy’s bedroom.”

  Gertie plopped down on the bed next to Marge. “Mama has me back in her clutches. Pretty soon we’ll be spending our Sunday nights together on the sofa watching Lawrence Welk, wearing matching plaid Bermuda shorts and singing along to that commercial with the dancing pickle. And we’ll be planning my wedding to a man who analyzes poop for a living.”

  “Well, lucky for you we’re not planning on living in Sinful,” Ida Belle said. “Besides, Marge and I are your best friends. We won’t let that happen.”

  Gertie hoped so. Their plans were to wait it out for three months in Sinful before moving to New Orleans, where a year’s lease on a three-bedroom house would become available, compliments of a retired intelligence officer who’d been one of their superiors. There, Gertie would complete her degree to become a teacher, and Ida Belle and Marge could take the few remaining courses they needed to receive their college diplomas.

  They were eager for the big-city life, where women were living more liberated lives and could be what they wanted to be. Ida Belle was right. After being spies in Vietnam, nobody was going to hold them back, certainly not Gertie’s mother or backward, small-town thinking. And having a bigger dating pool wouldn’t be bad, either. When it came to sexy men, New Orleans was the place to be. But could she last three months? In the same town as her mother? A dry town at that?

  “What did your mom say when you told her you were leaving in three months?” Ida Belle asked.

  Gertie cringed and suddenly that casserole her mother had served was rebelling in her stomach.

  “You didn’t tell her, did you?” Marge said.

  “I tried.” In that she opened her mouth to say it at the dinner table, then pictured her mother wailing in grief, so promptly asked for biscuits instead.

  “You’re going to have to tell her sometime.”

  “I will. But maybe it’s best if I’m not living here when I tell her. Knowing her, she’d ground me. And knowing me, I’d obey. Tell me we have a line on a short-term rental.”

  Ida Belle’s baby blues lit up. “In fact, there are two available. A two-bedroom and a three-bedroom. We have an appointment tomorrow to go look at the three-bedroom.”

  Marge got up from the bed. “One problem, though. Ellie and Paul Corbett are also looking at the three-bedroom. And they’re willing to rent for a longer stretch than us.”

  Gertie rolled her eyes. They were the newlyweds. “It’s not fair! They’ll get preferential treatment because they’re married. They don’t need three bedrooms, but if they want it, they’ll get it!”

  “Not necessarily,” Marge said. “Aunt Louanne called today and said she was going to stop by tonight and talk to Wade Guillory. He’s the property manager and will be there getting it ready to show. She said she’s going to throw in an incentive to tip the scales toward us.”

  Gertie smiled. Marge’s Aunt Louanne had been a spy during World War II. As a civilian contractor, she’d trained Gertie, Ida Belle and Marge when they’d enlisted in 1961. But one thing Gertie knew about spies. They never really retire. Louanne had the goods on Guillory and wouldn’t hesitate to use it. That three-bedroom was as good as theirs.

  Chapter Two

  GERTIE STARED AT THE Dalmatian whose gaze was fixed on the fire hydrant sitting just outside the glass window.

  “They really should dust old Spot,” Gertie whispered to Marge and Ida Belle, who were seated next to her on the plastic waiting-room chairs. In addition to serving as a property manager for Sinful Real Estate, Wade Guillory was also Sinful’s premier taxidermist.

  The three had been instructed to assemble at the taxidermy shop at ten that morning so Mr. Guillory could drive them to the three-bedroom rental for a tour. If Louanne’s talk with him the night before was a success, their tour would also include a lease signing.

  Gertie reached over to the stuffed dog and wiped her finger across the top of his head. “They probably haven’t dusted him since Mr. Guillory brought him to Career Day our last year of high school.”

  Ida Belle shook her head. “If you ask me, it’s a little cruel to have a dog spend eternity staring at a fire hydrant he can’t use. I don’t like that.”

  “I don’t like how Paul Corbett is here, but Mr. Guillory isn’t,” Gertie said. She glanced at Mr. Guillory’s inner office, visible to the waiting room by a pane of glass, where Guillory’s assistant, Bonnie Cotton, was handing over a set of keys to Paul Corbett.

  “She’d better not be giving Paul the keys to our house.”

  Paul shoved the keys in his pocket. Before leaving Bonnie’s office, he shot an angry glance at them through the glass window.

  “By the looks he’s giving us, I’d say those are the keys to the two-bedroom,” Ida Belle said, grinning. “Whatever Louanne held over Mr. Guillory, looks like it worked. I love that look on a man’s face when he realizes a female got something he wanted. Doesn’t happen very often, but when it does...”

  “It’s groovy,” Gertie said, finishing her thought.

  Paul opened the door to Bonnie’s office and stormed out.

  “Good morning, Paul,” Gertie chirped as he stomped into the waiting room and stopped to shoot them all another ugly look. Gertie sighed. “Look, I can tell you’re upset, and I think I know why. I can understand how you wanted the three-bedroom and I’m sorry if it makes you sore you didn’t get it. But I know you two lovebirds will adore that cozy two-bedroom on Oakdale.”

  He shot an extra-long glare at Gertie. “You should be sorry. That three-bedroom should have been ours.”

  “I’m not sorry,” Ida Belle said. “There are three of us and two of you.”

  “I’m not sorry either,” Marge said. “Stop being such a big baby about it.”

  Paul jabbed his finger at Marge to make his point. “This town would have been better off if the three of you never came back.”

  Gertie noticed his finger was shaking. He stormed to the glass door and shoved it open. Gertie called out to him. “Oh, Paul, on second thought...”

  He tossed a glance back at her as he stepped outside. Gertie combined a wave goodbye with a middle-finger salute, raising it high in the air for added effect.

  “I can’t tell you how relieved I am we got the house and I can be out from under my mama’s thumb,” Gertie said, watching as Paul squealed away in his car. “After you two left last night, I found out she opened the box I shipped home. You know what she did? She burned my Janis Joplin Cheap Thrills album. And I specifically wrote on the outside of the box, ‘Don’t open this, Mama.’” Gertie felt her lip shaking. “She took a little piece of my heart and tossed it in the church bonfire a week before we came home.”

  “Bonnie’s coming,” Marge said as she straightened in her chair.

  Gertie glanced up at the office window to see Bonnie Cotton walking toward the door to the waiting room. “It’s about time.”

  Bonnie stepped out, a look of concern on her face. Gertie jumped up from her chair. “What? What’s wrong?”

  Bonnie smiled. “Why, nothing Gertie. At least, I’m sure it’s nothing.”

  Gertie groaned. “Oh, great. Paul gets a house and we get nothing.”

  Ida Belle stood. “Let her talk. Is there a problem with the three-bedroom?”

  “Is that why Mr. Guillory’s not here?” Marge asked.

  Bonnie shook her head. “No, it’s yours. I spoke with Wade last night. He told me he had a talk with Louanne Boudreaux and decided to rent the three-bedroom to y’all.”

  “Buuuut,” Gertie said.

  “Well, it turns out he never came home last night. But—” Bonnie added quickly upon hearing Gertie releasing a painful moan, “that in itself is not unusual. I just got off the phone with his wife, Philomena. She said he came home for dinner and went back to the rental bec
ause he had more work to do. She said he sometimes gets so busy with maintenance work on the rentals that he works late into the evening and stays overnight. He probably worked so late that he’s still asleep over at the house.”

  Gertie could feel her pulse slowing. “Okay, sounds plausible.”

  Bonnie held up a pair of car keys. “Why don’t I just drive us all over and we’ll meet Wade there?”

  THE TWO-STORY BLUE and white Victorian was everything Marge had hoped it would be. A front porch with a swing. Room for two cars in the driveway, space out front for a third. When they got cars. That would be the first order of business after signing the papers for the house.

  “Do you like it?” Marge asked Gertie, who appeared so happy she was about to cry.

  Gertie nodded. “It would only be more perfect if it was surrounded by an alligator-infested moat and a drawbridge that would automatically pull up when my Mama stops by.” Gertie glanced at Bonnie. “She’s a bit overprotective.”

  Ida Belle opened the front gate of the white-picket fence and entered the property, the others following behind. “Well, I can see why Paul Corbett was upset. This place looks great. At least from the outside.”

  “Upset is putting it mildly,” Bonnie said. “When Mr. Guillory called to say he decided to rent to you three, he indicated he’d just gotten off the phone with Ellie. She was livid. They’re newlyweds, you know.”

  “Yeah, we know,” Ida Belle said, sounding annoyed. “Us single gals always get the leftovers. But not this time.”

  “Well, I hear you on that point,” Bonnie said as she closed the gate. “I have about twenty years on you three, and I never married, so I know how hard it can be. Sometimes a single girl just has to make her own way. I did. Without women’s lib, I might add. I own my own house, you know.”