89
I flew up to Boston, then on to Bangor, and Crystal drove me into town in her old pick-up. I never saw a bride so laid-back in all my days. She hadn't even had her nails done.
‘No point,’ she said ‘First, Marc'd never recognise me if I did. Second, I have a lynx skin in tanning liquor I need to take a look at before I'm through.’
We picked up Marc from his office, so we could all go get something to eat. One thing. He was nothing like her first husband. Matter of fact, you could have gotten two Trent Weavers out of Marc and still had flesh left to spare.
‘Y'all finished, then?’ she said, as he was climbing into the car. ‘Can we go off and get married and go to Africa and everything?’
‘Don't pressure me now, Crystal,’ he said. ‘We've got a big story breaking in there. I shouldn't even be out to dinner.’
He turned to me, gave me a big smile. ‘Outbreak of black-headed fireworm in Massachusetts,’ he said. ‘We're holding the front page.’
Marc was forty-one, same age as Grice, as a matter of fact, and he'd never been married neither. He said Crystal was the first woman he ever met was happier on a mountain trail than she was in a shopping mall.
I liked him, and it was plain to see Crystal was head over heels. The only thing I wished was, she would remember to moisturise at night. A girl spends so much time outdoors she has to think of her skin. It's something, to see your baby turn thirty.
They put me up at the Harbor House Inn. I had a great big canopy bed all to myself and breakfast brought to my room. Blueberry pancakes, hazelnut coffee. I just sent down for a lemon tea. When a person's going out on the ocean they can't be too careful, is what I think.
Ten a.m. the Dewey wagon-train rolled into the car park. I stood inside and watched them pile out. It was the first time I had seen Vern in twenty years. I thought he looked old, and maybe he thought the same about me. He was kinda bashful, though, having me and Martine around. First thing I said to him was, ‘I'm real sorry about Kirk.’
‘Let's say no more about it,’ he said. ‘Me and Bob Pick are back on tracks. Main thing is, we make sure Crystal has a great day.’
Martine was a bundle of energy, for a larger woman. She had dyed hair, burgundy red, and a Terylene pants-suit in sky-blue. Took me right by the arm and told me not to worry about a thing. Way I looked at it, it was my daughter's wedding day and it was entirely up to me what I worried about.
Her boy Eugene had a beer gut, and a wispy moustache. I don't believe I heard him speak all day. And his little wife, Filomena, was real homely too, always had her hand over her mouth when she smiled, which she did most of the time, and when I seen her teeth I understood why. Speaking of teeth, Mom Dewey had in new plates, top and bottom. And Crystal was right. She hadn't aged frail. She had gone hard and leathery.
‘Well,’ she said to me, ‘at least she's marrying a white man. She hadn't a been marrying a white man I wouldn't have closed up my store for the day.’
I never saw my girl look so beautiful. She only had a chainstore dress, cream with a chocolate trim, and an ivory wool wrap, but I guess she was wearing her happiness too. Marc was waiting on us down at the quayside, had his shirt buttoned to the neck but no tie. I guess that was the trend. In Texas we don't pay much heed to what the East Coast is doing.
It was a real sail-boat they had hired, a schooner called Bonaparte with canvas sails and everything. It even had a lounge downstairs with a soapstone fireplace.
Mom Dewey said, ‘Where's the preacher?’
We headed up the coast and I surprised myself. I liked the feel of that old boat dipping through the water. She was so well built, and the colour of the maples, just starting to turn, was so pretty, I didn't even bother thinking about shipwrecks or getting sick or anything.
Mom Dewey said, ‘Where's the Justice?’
They stopped the boat by a little granite island and Marc and Crystal made their vows and exchanged rings. Me and Vern both had to wipe a tear, and Mom Dewey heaved her breakfast into the bay and her bottom plate too, which accounts for her face looking kinda caved in in the pictures. There were seals in the water and, as soon as they had finished getting married, the bride and groom were over to the rail checking them out through their field-glasses.
Marc said they were harp seals. Crystal said they were young greys.
‘Uh-oh,’ he said. ‘Our first fight.’
It was the darlingest wedding I ever was at, and I've been to a few.
The boat people had everything ready. Lobsters for baking and all the fixings. They had a pit on the island, lined with firebricks, used it all the time. They'd had it lit since daybreak. Soon as we landed they spread seaweed over the hot bricks and lobsters on top and corn in the husk, pulled a tarp over the top to keep the steam in and served cold beer and Polish sausage while the dinner cooked.
I found myself next to Martine and kinda lost for small talk.
I said, ‘Business going okay?’ It was the best I could do.
‘Going great,’ she said. ‘Only one outfit bigger'n us now and they're out of state. I do the redworms. Vern and Eugene do the nightcrawlers. Course, I was laid for a while. I expect you heard. I had a cancer in my bosom.’
I said, ‘Good friend of mine got cancer of the cervix.’
She sucked in her breath. ‘They take it all away? They took all mine away.’
I said, ‘They took her womb, took her ovaries. I don't know what else they took,’
‘Best thing,’ she said. ‘She won't be needing it any more. Best they take it all away, give you a clean slate. That's what I got and I never felt better. Did I, Vern?’
He had wandered over to us, after he'd checked those folks knew how to cook lobster. ‘Never felt better, never looked better,’ he said, and he slipped his arm around her. There was no need for him to do a thing like that, right in front of me.
‘Well, Peg,’ he said. ‘So we finally got her off our hands.’
I said, ‘Marc's nice.’
‘Yeah,’ he said, a bit lukewarm. ‘Course, he's white-collar. He's a great one for reading and all that. Can't say I've ever seen him roll up his sleeves. Still, we got Eugene for that. And Crystal's not shy of getting her hands dirty. Takes after her old man, there.’
I said, ‘You remember when we were at Drampton? You remember those coney-skin gloves she got? Wouldn't be parted for them, didn't matter how hot she was? I reckon that was the start of this taxidermy thing.’
He said, ‘Could be you're right. And that cat we had at Wichita. She was always trying to train him up. Always was good around animals.’
Martine didn't like us reminiscing. ‘Vern,’ she said. Cut right across me. ‘Vern, you think your mom's okay?’
Mom Dewey was just fine. She was sitting on a foldaway chair telling Filomena how corn in the husk was schwartze food. Filomena was nodding and smiling.
Crystal said, ‘Did you have insurance on those dentures, Gramma?’
‘Only thing I got insurance on is your daddy's life,’ she said. ‘He goes before I do, I get one thousand dollars. Why didn't you get a preacher, make a proper job of getting married? You looked into the legal side of this? You need to know where you stand in a court of law. You drop dead tomorrow, he might stand to get your worm inheritance. Or he might not. I don't know. A lawyer'd tell you, but he'd send you a bill for doing it. That's a lawyer for you. He'll pocket your hard-earned money just for telling you the time of day.’
Filomena smiled some more.
Crystal said, ‘You ready to eat, Gramma?’
‘I'll just suck on a little lobster,’ she said. ‘Don't bother bringing me none of that nigger corn.’
We had applesauce layer-cake and drank their good health in blush wine and then we sailed back to Camden, to wave them off to Africa — first stop, the honeymoon suite at the Lake Alamoosook Sunset Hotel.
‘Mom,’ she said, when she was hugging me goodbye, ‘this was worth waiting for.’ And her big bear of a husband pu
t his arm around my shoulder.
‘You haven't lost her,’ he said. ‘You just gained me.’
Read me like a book. I never did like the winding up of a wedding party.
‘Well,’ Vern said, ‘if ever you're Skowhegan way …’ Like I ever would be.
‘Yes,’ Martine said. ‘Don't be a stranger now. We are family.’
I thought to kiss Vern goodbye and may be Martine too, once on each cheek. We do that all the time in Dallas. But Vern of course wasn't accustomed to it. We ended up banging noses.
I caught a whiff of him, though, just took me back all those long years. He still smelled of Vitalis. Vitalis and pie.
90
I sent Kath pictures of the wedding.
‘What a lovely couple they make,’ she wrote back.
I've seen some nice sheepskin rugs on the market I thought they might like, be nice for a bedside mat, but if there's something else you think of let me know. I expect they've already got table mats.
Now, I'm after your money. It's called a sponsored walk, all along the coast road, Hunstanton, Wells, you'd know the route. You can do five miles or ten or fifteen and we have to get people to pay us, so much the mile. Me and May are trying for ten miles, so we're in training. You should see the plimsolls we've got. It's in aid of Huntington's Disease.
I phoned her. I said, ‘What's the best offer you've had?’
‘Pound a mile,’ she said. ‘That's from the man I always go to for my motors.’
I said ‘Okay, I'll double that. What's Huntington's Disease?’
‘That's our family trouble, that I mentioned,’ she said. ‘In the nerves. They haven't found anything can be done for it so far, but we keep hoping. And of course, that takes money, keeping the scientists going. So there's twenty of us, doing this walk. Dennis Jex is going to try for the fifteen miles. I told him, though, we might need him following behind with his St John bandages. Now, how's Betty going on?’
Betty and Slick were going great guns with their fat-burner product. They had ten distributors working under them, paying them a percentage, and they still did their own selling, out every night, going into people's homes, showing them before and after pictures of satisfied customers.
I'd said to her, ‘I hope you're enjoying all that money you're making. I hope you're not giving it all away.’
‘Giving it away is what I enjoy,’ she said. ‘Tell you what, Peg. Doesn't matter how much we make, it can't buy me the two things I want.’
She wanted a new pair of legs and to know that Delta and the great-grandbaby were safe, wherever they might be.
I said ‘Have you tried support hose?’
‘Tried everything,’ she said. ‘Makes no difference. And there's still no word from Delta.’
She had had Delta staying with her, carrying Bulldog's child. Then she just took off. Carla's theory was, Bulldog was back on the scene. Deana had said if he was he better watch out because she had a mind to shoot him, and Delta too, and any brats they brought into the world.
I was always glad to hear Carla pick up when I called Betty. She had a wry way about her, reminded me of Crystal.
I said to her, ‘Does Deana have a gun?’
‘I believe she does,’ she said. ‘Course, whether she knows how to use it is another question. She could take out half the city before she got a fatal slug into Bulldog. That brain of his is a awful small target.’
I said, ‘Carla, that kinda talk makes my blood run cold. Don't Deana have any motherly feelings for Delta? Don't she care she's got a little grandbaby out there?’
‘Aunty Peggy,’ she said, ‘what the hell do I know? I can't even believe I'm related to her. If it wasn't for Mom, I'd have changed my name and gone away long ago. North Dakota sounds about right.’
I asked her what she knew about this Huntington's Disease. She never even heard of it. Neither had Crystal.
‘I'll find out for you, though,’ she said.
Our season was easing off somewhat. We had a clear week coming up in June. Grice wanted to go on a trip, but Tucker wouldn't leave Miss Lady because she was predicting to die any minute.
I said, ‘If you're looking for someone to keep you company in Key Biscayne, I'm available. If you're looking for someone to babysit Miss Lady, something urgent just came up.’
He said, ‘How do you feel about New Mexico?’
I said, ‘Long as we avoid Kirtland. I already served my sentence there.’
So we agreed to go take a look at Santa Fe and Albuquerque, and Grice was just starting up, singing about being bound for the Rio Grande, when I took the call from Carla.
‘Aunty Peggy?’ she said. ‘I really need your help.’
Betty's old trouble was back. They had told her at the hospital she had to get ray treatment but that was gonna put her out of action for six weeks and she was refusing.
I said, ‘What happens if she don't take the treatment?’ Fool question.
I said to Grice, ‘Change of plan. I have to go to San Antonio, talk some sense into Betty Gillis.’
His face fell. ‘We're not bound for the Rio Grande, then?’ he said.
I said, ‘Ever been to San Antonio?’
Next thing, he was singing about Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier.
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Betty said, ‘I don't have time for this. We just won Sales Team of the Year and we have to go to Houston, get presented with our certificate. Plus, I promised Danni a Sweet Sixteen party. Plus, my kitchen-dinette hasn't seen a lick of paint in three years and I'm ashamed for anybody to see it.’
‘Plus, Mom,’ Carla said, ‘you have an adenocarcinoma.’
I hated to be in on all this. It didn't seem right. But Carla said, ‘You're like family. You're the only one goes all the way back.’
‘Well,’ Betty said, ‘that's what they say I have now. They said I had a little wart on my insides. Before that they said I had a dropping womb. I'm not convinced they know what I do have.’
Carla looked worn out. ‘What can I do with her?’ she said. ‘My own mother has a death wish.’
‘Oh, stop that!’ Betty said. ‘We'll go to Houston, I'll do Danni her party …’
Carla said, ‘Mom! Danni doesn't want a party. She just wants to go to the mall and hang out …’
‘… do Danni her party, freshen up my dinette and then I'll think about ray treatment. If they didn't change their mind in the meanwhile, that is. Peg, who's the friend you're travelling with? Is he your beau?’
Grice was out to the Alamo. ‘Don't worry about me,’ he said. ‘Go do what you have to do. And tomorrow I'm going to the zoo.’
Carla had to go to work. Me and Betty sat out in the yard with iced tea and egg salad. ‘I'm fifty-six, Peg,’ she said.
‘Me too,’ I said. ‘You think I was getting younger?’
‘You feel fifty-six?’
‘I dunno,’ I said, ‘Sometimes, I guess. I felt fifty-two when my mom died.’
‘My body feels about hundred and fifty-six,’ she said. ‘But in my mind I'm no different than when I was in high school. That's what I don't get. How come your head don't keep in step with your insides? And where's all that time gone, that's what I wonder? Fifty-six years. I still haven't finished that quilt I started when Ed got posted to McConnell. That was to be for Deana's hope-chest. I was gonna make a quilt for each of my girls. This rate I won't even have one finished for Destiny Rae.’ Destiny Rae was the great-grandbaby. Hadn't been seen since she was six months old and Delta took off with her.
I said, ‘I wouldn't give that quilt another thought. Comforters are easier. You can just throw them in the washer.’
‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Stitching them's hard on the eyes too. Then I'd had in mind to go to college. Get my exams so I could teach elementary school.’
I said, ‘Why don't you? You'd be so great at that.’ I was getting sick of the sound of my own cheeriness.
‘No,’ she said. ‘It's too late now. I couldn't leave Slick in the lurch af
ter we've built up our Lipo-Zipp sales. Did I ever send you a sample?’
I had Betty's free samples falling outta my bathroom cabinet. I said, ‘Well at least take the treatment. How are you gonna keep your sales figures up if you're too sick to work?’
She was quiet for a while. ‘Do you know what they did, Peg? When they had me in to find out why my legs were aching so? They put stuff inside me. It lights up, kinda fluorescent on the X-ray. But they put it up my back-passage, Peg. I'd known that's what they were intending to do, I never would have gone.’
I said, ‘That why you won't take the treatment?’
She didn't answer.
I said, ‘Has Sherry visited lately?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘I don't expect her to trek back here. She has her life.’
I said, ‘Ever hear from Ed?’
‘No,’ she said.
‘You and Deana speaking?’
‘Deana has her problems,’ she said. ‘She has her allergies. And she's had nothing but bad luck with men.’
I said, ‘Carla's a good kid.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘She's a darling girl.’
I said, ‘She's worried what's gonna happen to you, if you don't listen to the doctors.’
‘I'll think about it,’ she said. ‘And that's all I'm saying. What did you say your beau's name is?’
I said, ‘His name is Grice and he's no beau of mine. He's a homosexual. That means he goes with men.’
‘Peggy Dewey!’ she said. ‘I don't want to hear anything about that.’
She liked him, though, when he dropped by. He brought her candy and flowers.
‘William Barrett Travis,’ he said, ‘drew a line in the dust and said every man willing to fight to the death should step over it and Jim Bowie had them carry him over the line, because he was on a stretcher.’
‘We know,’ I said. ‘We grew up here. We heard it all before.’
‘Eighteen hundred Mexicans,’ he said, ‘against two hundred Texans. I got Tucker a Jim Bowie paper-knife from the gift store, but I've a mind to bring him here anyway. He'd love the gardens.’
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