The Widows of Eden

by George Shaffner

  “Not at all, dear.”

  That was another déjà vu. “Okay. What are you going to do with it?”

  “As you can see, Vernon can’t possibly visit everyone himself, but he doesn’t want to disappoint anyone either, so the three of us are going to divide it up.”

  Patsy Mancuso, who was sitting six feet away, said out loud, “Can you raise the dead, honey? Oops! Don’t answer that. Just stay away from my husband. He’s right where I want him.” Did I mention that she’s a widow, too?

  “She’s right,” Loretta remarked. “The people on that list will be expecting Mr. Moore. What can you tell them?”

  Patsy appeared in our little circle before any of the widows could reply, swaying slightly, like a willow in a fresh breeze. “Excuse me. Which one of you is the Chief Widow?”

  “We’re friends, not Indians,” Birdie answered. “There’s no ‘Chief Widow.’”

  “Okay, but you all know Mr. Moore, right?”

  “Yes. He’s our very close friend and traveling companion.”

  “Terrific. What the hell is he: a man, a ghost, a guardian angel, what? Everybody in the Circle wants to know. They’re just afraid to ask outright.”

  The Widow Marion said, “He’s a man, dear, but an exceptional one, don’t you think?”

  “No shit. Where’s he now; out saving the world?”

  “My understanding is that he’s spending the afternoon with his daughter. He intends to save the world later on.”

  “Well, tell him to hurry up, will ya’? We need some friggin’ rain.” Patsy held up her vodka lemonade in salute and took a large swallow, then she headed toward the kitchen, stopping occasionally to steady herself on a chair or the shoulder of a fellow Circle girl.

  As we watched her go, Dottie commented, “Remind me to pick up her keys.”

  Loretta smiled and steered the conversation back to my parking-lot guests. “Vern hinted that you all work together, but he wouldn’t explain how. Now I get it. You’re his bailers, aren’t you? You bail him out of trouble.”

  “Not as a matter of routine,” Marion replied. “More often than not, it’s our job to get Vernon into trouble, not out of it.”

  Dottie rolled her eyes at Lo and me. “I don’t suppose you’d care to explain that.”

  “That would be against the rules, Sheriff, particularly in a crowd with such well-trained ears. If you wish, though, I’d be happy to stop by your office tomorrow.”

  “You must be a mind reader, Marion; I was thinkin’ the same way. We have a meeting at the Abattoir first thing but I should be back in the office by ten. Come any time afterwards.”

  “At the Abattoir? Isn’t that where your Quilting Circle is located?”

  Dottie frowned. “Forgive me for sayin’ so, but you all seem to be real well informed.”

  “Oh yes, Sheriff! Vernon is quite thorough. Will all three of you be attending tomorrow’s meeting?”

  “You’re looking at half the board of governors. We’ll all be there.”

  Marion smiled and spoke to Loretta. “Might Birdie and I drop by your house tomorrow afternoon? We’d so like to meet Laverne.”

  “Uh, okay. Sure. How about three o’clock?”

  “Tea time? That would be marvelous.”

  “Shouldn’t Wilma be there, too?”

  Eloise turned to me. “I was hoping that you could introduce me to your fiancé in the afternoon. Perhaps you’d like to ride down to the River House in Seagull, my motor coach. It’s very comfortable.”

  Loretta’s eyes were the size of saucers by then and Dottie looked like she was about to draw her pistol. “I should speak to Clem first,” I said. “He’s not much for entertaining, even when he’s chipper.”

  “I understand, Wilma. If you’re unsure, feel free to speak to Vernon, too.”

  Eloise caught Marion’s eye and pointed to her watch. Birdie interjected, “Please accept our apologies. We have to go, but could I ask one last question?”

  “Of course,” I answered smugly, just like Mr. Moore would have.

  Birdie wasn’t impressed. “We just love your red parasols. They’re the perfect remedy for the sun. Can we pick them up at Millet’s?”

  I felt like smacking myself on the side of the head, and I wasn’t alone. In unison, Dottie and Loretta stammered, “Parasols?”

  Chapter 14

  THE OLD SWITCHEROO

  IN ALL HIS YEARS of servitude to my fiancé, Buford Pickett had never been invited to the River House. On the evening of his inaugural visit, Lily said he fretted like a fifteen-year-old boy before his first date. He was as quiet as a monk at the dinner table by habit, but he talked a streak that night, and then he changed clothes afterward. Buford likes to wear polo shirts in the summertime, but they have never been kind to his physique. In yellow, which was the color he chose for the occasion, he looked like a giant-sized lemon on two cracker barrels.

  Marie answered the door at the River House and escorted him to the master suite, where Clement was watching CNN while he finished a bowl of homemade chicken noodle soup with garlic butter croutons. In case you’re wondering, that was no mistake. Marie makes her chicken soup from scratch, including the noodles, which she hand rolls. I kid you not.

  Clem clicked off the TV. “Hello, Buford. Have you two met before? Marie here is the best chef in the state, period.”

  Marie blushed. Buford answered, “We’ve seen each other around town.”

  “I thought you might. It’s not like we live in New York, is it? Have you had dinner yet?”

  “Yessir, Mr. Tucker. I’m afraid I have.”

  “Would you like some of Marie’s chicken soup anyway? It’ll be worth the discomfort.”

  “No, sir, but thanks for the offer.”

  “You heard the man, Marie. I’d appreciate it if you could take this away.”

  “Would you like anything else, Mr. Tucker?”

  “Maybe I would. I don’t suppose you’ve got any tapioca pudding in the fridge?”

  “I don’t, but I’d be happy to make you some. Are you sure you can hold it down?”

  “The way I feel right now I could hold down a pound of nachos with your homemade salsa. I’ll settle for the tapioca, though. Vanilla, if you don’t mind.”

  “I’ll bring you a bowl as soon as it’s ready,” Marie said, then she took Clem’s dishes and went off in search of Pearline, who had to eavesdrop while Marie was making the tapioca. When Pearline arrived on station, Clem was saying, “Did you take my advice and put together a lay-off plan for the bank?”

  “Yessir. Would you like to see it?”

  “Nope. Just send it up the line. Do it tomorrow; don’t wait for Omaha to call.”

  “I appreciate the tip, sir.”

  “You’re welcome, but that’s not why I invited you over tonight. I want you to terminate your investigation into Vernon Moore’s background.”

  “You what?”

  “You’re an important man in this town, Buford. You shouldn’t be spinning your wheels on a fool’s errand like that.”

  “I, … I agree, sir. Thank you.”

  “Have you heard about the three widows who are staying at the Come Again?”

  “Everybody has. You should see their motor homes. They’re huge.”

  “I’m seeing one tomorrow, as a matter of fact. One of the widows is paying me a visit. The rumor mill says they’re close to Vernon Moore. Is that what you hear?”

  “Yes, sir. Everybody says so.”

  “That’s what I thought. I want you to switch your investigation — to them.”

  The room went quiet, then Buford said, “You want me to investigate the widows?”

  “Hell, yes. If we can’t find anything on Vernon, let’s triple our chances.”

  “But …”

  “For just one minute, Buford, I want you to close your mouth and open the mind your parents blessed you with. I’m giving you a chance to prove your theory. For all we know, those women served in Cleopatra’s cou
rt, or maybe they fought with Joan of Arc. If they did, then your Lady Be Good theory would look pretty damned smart, wouldn’t it?”

  “I guess so, sir.”

  Clem looked down his nose and said, “Uh uh, Buford. No, you don’t. You may not guess anymore. That part has to stop, right here and right now. Get on top of those widows, and get me some hard, verifiable data by tomorrow night. Can you do that?”

  “Yessir.”

  LIKE MOST FOLKS, I prefer being with family and friends to being with myself. It’s healthier from a mental point of view. There are exceptions, though, and one of them is the evening after I’ve had an impromptu reception for three incredibly strange guests and a houseful of curious, over-served Circle girls. Once the dishes were done and the widows had spirited Mr. Moore off to dinner, all I wanted was to fix myself a bowl of popcorn and collapse in front of the TV.

  As a cook who takes pride in her skills, I am against microwaved popcorn on principal. You might as well nuke a steak or a duck. Prepared properly, popcorn is a delicacy. I buy a premium brand and heat it on the range in a special-made aluminum pan with a crank in the handle that I can turn to keep the kernels from burning, and then I add just the right amount of melted butter and salt. They may not be the healthiest condiments, but I doubt that popcorn would taste half as good if it was sprinkled with hummus or bean sprouts.

  I had just curled up in front of the TV with a fresh bowl of steaming hot Orville Redenbacher’s and an icy cold bottle of root beer when my very own sheriff-supplied cell phone rang. Since it was a gift, I felt obligated to answer it.

  “Hello,” I said.

  “Wilma, this is Hail Mary. I just got off the phone with Dottie. She says you had quite a party this afternoon.”

  “I did. You should have been here, if not to meet the widows then to sample Virgie’s lemonade punch. I got asked for the recipe twice.”

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it, but we public servants are required to serve the public every once in a while. Otherwise, they vote. Dottie says that the three widows work with Vernon in some capacity. Is that true?”

  “That appears to be the case.”

  “I also hear that they’re well informed. Did you have a chance to ask them about Vernon’s nefarious ‘Clem-or-rain’ deal?”

  “In the middle of a crowd of Circle girls? I don’t think so. Why? Do you plan on asking them yourself?”

  “I might. The umbrellas were good for morale, but they’re a pitiful gesture against a seventy-five-million-dollar bribe. We need a plan.”

  “What kind of plan?”

  “If I knew, we wouldn’t need a plan; we’d already have one. Since you’re Clem’s fiancée, I need to remind you before tomorrow’s meeting that the Circle’s goal remains the same: we want Vernon to ask for Clem’s life and rain; not one or the other. Do you understand?”

  “No, Mary. For a fact, I don’t. I’ve never been so confused in my life.”

  “Join the club. You all have a nice evening.”

  My popcorn was lukewarm by the time she hung up, but it’s not like I could violate my principles and nuke it. I popped a handful in my mouth and checked the TV schedule to see if any old-fashioned movies were playing. The first one I found was The Grapes of Wrath, starring Henry Fonda! Did the station manager think we needed a history lesson?

  I searched the cable directory for Singin’ in the Rain with Gene Kelly, or The Rainmaker with Burt Lancaster, or even Finian’s Rainbow with Fred Astaire, but they were nowhere to be found, so I settled on The Flight of the Phoenix with James Stewart. It was fine escapist fare, if a tad ironic from a topographical point of view.

  Just before I went to bed, I stuck my head through the front drapes to check on the widows. Marion’s motor home was still gone, but the other two were parked side-by-side just as they had been earlier in the day. A short, wide man in a yellow knit shirt and a black cowboy hat was standing about five feet from the rear of the white RV with a flashlight trained on its license plate. I would’ve called 9-1-1 right then and there, but I could see his Cornhusker-red Cadillac parked under the streetlight at the base of my driveway.

  It was Buford Pickett snooping on the widows. He was darned lucky he didn’t run into Road Rage.

  Men are such boys.

  Chapter 15

  THE PRINCE CHARMING MYTH

  LIKE MOST TEENAGED GIRLS of my day, I fell for the Prince Charming Myth hook, line, and sinker. It’s not like I blame Walt Disney, not by himself anyway. I knew going in that Al, my husband-to-be, had faults, but they seemed small enough through the misty lens of my love (although a few of his physical assets remained ironically large). I was even fond of his rough spots. They made him fun and even a mite dangerous, and I was sure that I could polish him up as we raised a family and grew old together.

  What a silly young fool I was! Al changed after we got married, but in the opposite direction I expected. Instead of maturing into a devoted husband, he reverted to the peevish, self-centered child he had been before we met. But don’t be fooled; I do not take my delusions lightly. A woman never can, especially when there are children in the picture. I clung to the tatters of the Prince Charming Myth for upwards of thirteen years before I finally put myself and my girls out of our collective misery and got a d-i-v-o-r-c-e.

  I may have given up my virginity before my marriage, but I lost something of far greater consequence after it was over: my capacity to adore a man. In its place were skepticism and distrust, which evolved over time into a form of detachment driven by self-preservation. Even when I accepted Clem’s proposal, I knew that I could never adore him, but at least I wasn’t foolish enough to believe that I could change him either. That’s the upside and downside of detachment right there, like two peanuts in a shell.

  Then Clem got sick, which put my detachment to the test, and then he tried to buy off Mr. Moore, which was more of a test than either my head or my heart could stand. The upshot was that I couldn’t get to sleep that night, no matter how hard I tried, and I tried everything. I counted sheep but quit at a thousand or so. I recalled what it was like to sit through Algebra II class in high school: “If one man drives to the store at twenty-five miles per hour …” When that didn’t work, I turned on the TV and watched the Weather Channel, where I learned that the entire eastern seaboard was getting pelted with rain! Finally, in the depths of my desperation, I dragged myself out of bed and took a hot, steaming bath with perfumed salts in it.

  That was not a good decision. I woke up like a spring-loaded, size twelve, albino raisin at seven fifteen, convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that Mr. Moore had left my premises without so much as a cup of tea, and that was before I remembered that I was due at the Abattoir at oh-seven-thirty. Luckily, I was soaking wet and stunk like a Texas whorehouse.

  I took the fastest shower in the history of womankind, dried and brushed my hair, threw on a running outfit, and dashed upstairs to tell Clara that I had a Circle emergency so I could not fix her oatmeal until I got back. That’s not the sort of news a rich recluse likes to receive, but it’s easier to deliver when you’re pretty sure that you won’t get any backtalk. I groveled for a minute anyway, and then I sprinted down to the main floor — to find an empty household. Mr. Moore was gone. The giant buses were gone. If I had dropped a Q-tip in my kitchen, my daughter Winona would’ve heard it in Council Bluffs.

  That was when my special phone rang. It was Bebe, wondering if a certain person had forgotten a certain meeting. I promised that I would get to the Abattoir as fast as I could and then, since I am a woman of my word, I got in my car and drove over. As it turns out, I could have walked. Hail Mary and Dottie had arrived only a minute or two before I did.

  After I had taken my customary seat next to Lo, Hail Mary announced, “This is day one hundred and twenty of the drought and we have a full agenda.” Lily Pickett began to interrupt, but Mary would have none of it. She looked across the table and said, “I know you’re chomping at the bit, Lily, and we’ll ge
t to you in a second, but I’d like to start with the news from Hereford Haven Ranch. Will you fill us all in, Sheriff?”

  Dottie reported, “I got word this morning that Hereford Haven has laid off four hands and they’re liquidating a thousand head. For all practical purposes, that means they’re shutting down for the season, and we believe it’s just the tip of the iceberg …”

  Lily couldn’t hold herself in any longer. “Buford said we passed the ‘tipping point’ at dinner last night. He said it could rain cats and dogs tomorrow and fifty farms in the tri-county area would still go belly up.”

  “Fifty? My dear Lord.”

  “That’s the upside, Wilma. He believes it’ll be a hundred or more if we don’t get rain in the next thirty days, but that’s not the part that scared me the most.”

  Lily paused for effect, as if we needed any. “Excuse me,” Dottie declared, “but what in the world could’ve scared you more than that?”

  “He told me that we need to look at this situation the way Clem Tucker would: as an opportunity.”

  “Jesus H. Christ! Did I hear you right? Did you just say that Buford sees the drought as an opportunity? Did he tell you that himself?”

  “Yes, and he’s willing to put our money where his mouth is. The bids on the Bowe place are below fair market, so he’s planning to pick up the mortgage himself. He’s looking at the Knepper place, too.”

  “Long live the king; the king is dead,” Hail Mary moaned. “Buford Pickett has anointed himself successor to the Tucker throne.”

  “Clem isn’t gone yet, the bastard,” Lily protested. “We can’t count him out.”

  I was every bit as distraught as my comrades-in-arms, but I couldn’t sit there and let them talk about my cancer-stricken Clement like that anymore. “He’s not a bastard, Lily,” I said with a little extra authority. “He’s a sick bastard. We all need to remember that.”

  “I apologize, Wilma. I shouldn’t have been so unkind. Did you know that my husband drove down to see your sick bastard of a fiancé last night?”

  “He did? Was Marie able to listen in?” Mary asked.