The Red Hat Society's Queens of Woodlawn Avenue

by Regina Hale Sutherland

  Another woman who resigned from the committee within forty-eight hours of the luncheon said she was leaving town. I might have believed her, if I hadn’t heard later that day from Linda that the same woman had asked to be transferred to a different committee. One by one, they all fled until I was the only one left. The sole inhabitant of my fiefdom.

  “What are you going to do?” Linda asked at our next Red Hat meeting. It was Saturday night again, exactly a week since the first time I’d met my new friends. This time we were meeting at Grace’s house, the spade-shaped arch entirely appropriate to the gardening tyrant who had been working me like a galley slave in my own backyard for the last few days.

  “I don’t know.” It was difficult not to sound pathetic even though the transportation committee’s tasks were fairly routine. Hire a valet service and security officers to keep an eye on all the Mercedes and BMWs. Arrange for shuttle buses to ferry the guests from the parking lot at the entrance of the botanical garden to the grand old mansion-turned-museum where the ball was held. It wasn’t brain surgery, but it was also a lot of details for one person to manage.

  “It would serve Roz right if all the guests had to hike from the parking lot to the marquee,” Linda snapped. “People would remember it happened on her watch.”

  “Yes, but they’d also remember I was the one who dropped the ball, so to speak. I’m sure Roz would be happy to remind everyone in the country club set of just who had been responsible for the failure. I’ll figure out something.”

  I was also still waiting for Henri to return my call. Jane had been nudging me all week to call him again, telling me that a good businesswoman had to be persistent, but, once more, my southern upbringing made me balk at behavior that might be construed as pushy.

  “Tonight, we start teaching you how to bid,” Grace said, frowning at Linda and me so that we dropped our discussion of the Cannon Ball and focused on the game at hand. I still didn’t own a red hat, so Grace had lent me a perky crimson beret in honor of the possibility of securing Henri as my first client.

  “The important thing about bidding,” Grace said, “is that you have to do it in neutral, dispassionate way. No inflection, no emotion. And no extra words.”

  “No sending signals,” Jane added. “That’s a huge no-no.”

  Frankly, I was relieved to find a place where subtext wasn’t allowed. “Okay, I can do that.”

  “Openings bids are the way you start a conversation with your partner to try and find your eight-card fit,” Grace explained.

  “Eight-card fit. Right.” I remembered that from the last meeting. It put the odds in your favor, because if you and your partner had eight of the thirteen trump cards, you held the advantage.

  “The suits have a ranking among themselves, too,” Grace added.

  “Rank?”

  “Spades are the highest, then hearts. Those are the major suits. Diamonds are third, and clubs come in fourth. Those two are the minor suits.”

  “Count the number of high card points in your hand,” Grace said. “Do you remember how to do that? Aces are four, kings three, etcetera.”

  “I remember.”

  “The dealer gets to bid first,” Grace said. “You need to have twelve or more high card points to open. If you don’t have enough points, then you pass.”

  Okay, passing I could handle. It’s what I’d wanted to do with that phone call to Henri today, before I’d summoned the spectre of my mother and, thus, my courage. I looked down at the cards in my hand and counted the points. Fourteen. Rats. I would have to bid something. But what?

  “Remember to put length before strength,” Linda advised me.

  “Meaning what?”

  “In bridge,” Linda said, “it’s not just about high cards. You want to have lots of cards from one suit.”

  I looked down at the cards in my hand. I had the ace, king, and queen of clubs in my hand, but then I also had the ace and jack of hearts and three medium hearts. “Length over strength, hm?” It sounded wrong to me, but these ladies had been playing for a long time. “Okay, one heart.”

  “Good,” said Grace. “You don’t want to open at the two level unless you have more than twenty points.”

  “You can open at the two level?”

  “Only with an extraordinary hand. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, let’s just concentrate on the basics.”

  Grace collected the cards, took the second deck Jane had shuffled, and dealt once more. “We’ll just keep dealing new rounds so you can get the feel for opening bids.”

  We covered more ground that night in my introduction to the intricacies of bidding. It was like learning pig Latin or Morse code. More talk of distribution, balanced and unbalanced hands. Eventually I got so confused that they had to make me a chart, which helped. But by the end of the evening, I was discouraged. They’d said learning to play bridge was simple, but so far I couldn’t agree. This process was turning out to be strewn with as many minefields as the Belle Meade social scene. I said as much to Linda when we took a break to eat more of Jane’s delicious pound cake. Tonight it was topped with strawberries and real whipped cream.

  “Yes, but you learned how to maneuver in that social circle,” Linda said, “and you’ll learn this, too. It just takes some time to absorb all the information.”

  She had a point there. I’d put a foot wrong several times when Jim and I had first begun to make our mark socially. Eventually, though, I’d learned who had been married to whom, who wasn’t speaking to whom, and who had been sleeping with whom. There had come a point when I could make out a seating chart for a charity fund-raiser without creating any combustible mixtures.

  “I never knew that bridge was mostly about the bidding.”

  “Well, whoever wins the bidding gets the contract. They have the power to shape their destiny. Win enough contracts, and you win the game. Win enough games, and you win the rubber.”

  “Rubber?”

  “It’s like a set in tennis.”

  “And the match? How many rubbers is it?”

  “That depends. Everyone has to agree at the beginning what you’re playing to. Some people like to play forever. Others like to keep it short and sweet.”

  As overwhelmed as I was by all the rules of bridge, I was starting to take some comfort in them. Their structure was starting to emerge, and with absolutes in my life pretty scarce on the ground, the world of bridge gave me some respite. I was even starting to enjoy the hats.

  “Want to try more opening bids?” Grace asked as she cleared away the plates.

  “Sure.” I hurriedly stuffed the last bite in my mouth. “I need the practice.”

  Grace smiled benevolently. “It’s the only way we learn, dear. The only way.”

  The next morning found me slightly less melancholy and almost enjoying the solitude of a Sunday morning on my patio. I had a real cup of coffee in hand, not the Sanka from last week’s despair, and I was surveying with pride my gardening efforts of the last week. Grace and I had made it about a third of the way around the fence line, and the flower beds were beginning to look at least a little domesticated. When I finished my coffee, I was going to see if I could start the ancient lawn mower I’d inherited from my mother. It had lived for years in our basement, since Jim and I had employed a lawn service. Linda’s husband, Bob, had given the old mower the once-over yesterday and pronounced it as good as new. I’d been grateful for Bob’s quiet help. The chic and social Linda was married to perhaps the most introverted human being on the planet.

  “Bob says the mower will run great,” Linda said when they brought it back from his workshop. Bob nodded in confirmation of his assessment. “Just remember not to give it too much gas or it will stall,” Linda added. Bob grunted his affirmation of this advice and went back to his workshop.

  I was draining the dregs of my coffee when my phone rang, and I traipsed inside to the kitchen to answer it.

  “Hello?” I was getting good at leaning against t
he counter when I talked on the phone. I felt tethered somehow, less lost, with the short cord securing me in place.

  “Ellie? It’s Jim.”

  Not again. Were his Sunday morning phone calls going to become a habit?

  “Hello, Jim.”

  “Is this a bad time?”

  I stifled a bark of laughter. Did he mean right this moment or this whole phase of my life in general?

  “I was about to mow the lawn.” I tried to keep my voice as dispassionate as possible.

  “Why don’t you call our service?” For years, a wiry man by the name of Elijah had done our yard maintenance.

  “Because I can’t afford to.” I wasn’t going to beat around the bush. “I think you know why.”

  “Oh.” Now he was as monosyllabic as Linda’s husband Bob.

  “Did you need something, Jim?”

  “Need something?”

  “I assume that’s why you’re calling.” Tiffany was definitely taking a toll on his IQ.

  “I just….” His voice was suddenly muffled, as if he’d cupped his hand over the receiver. I heard him say, “Okay, okay. I’ll ask her,” in an irritated tone.

  “Just what, Jim?” Good. I hoped she was keeping him on as short a tether as the one on my ancient phone.

  “Do you want me to come mow your lawn for you?”

  Okay, that was the last thing I’d expected him to say. Evidently Jim was feeling remorse for something.

  “I don’t think so. I can manage.”

  “You might have some other things around the house you need help with.”

  “If I do, I can call someone.” Now he was being nice to me? After all the pain he’d caused me over the last nine months?

  “I don’t mind.”

  “Jim, what on earth is going on?”

  Again, muffled voices in the background. “Nothing.”

  Nothing. I knew a lot about Jim’s nothings. They had been his standard response when he was stonewalling me. And then it hit me. Maybe Jim was having a little bit of buyer’s remorse. Maybe things with Tiffany and her nubile body weren’t panning out quite as he’d hoped. Maybe she didn’t fit quite as nicely on the back of his Harley as he’d thought.

  At the thought, my own hopes ignited like they’d been struck by a match. My pulse thrummed in my throat. Maybe Jim had finally come out of the sex-induced trance he’d been in.

  “You can tell me,” I said softly. “Anything.”

  I couldn’t believe how, even after all he’d put me through, I was standing there, phone pressed to my ear, dying to hear him say he’d made a mistake. That he wanted me back.

  “It’s just that…”

  “Yes?”

  More whispering, and then Jim shushing someone in the background. “I shouldn’t ask you this.”

  My heart rate tripled, and though I knew I shouldn’t, I let myself hope for a return to the familiar. Yes, I should have my pride, but the idea that this whole nightmare might come to an end flooded me with relief. I could pack my things and go home, and while I would be grateful to my new friends for the help they’d offered, I wouldn’t need it after all. I felt like I might actually take flight.

  “You can ask me anything.” I was ready to sacrifice my pride, or whatever else it took, to have my old life back. This new one was too frightening, too overwhelming.

  “Well, okay.” Jim drew a deep breath. “Tiffany found your mother’s wedding dress in the cedar closet in the attic, and she just fell in love with it. Said vintage is the ‘in’ thing. I know it’s a lot to ask, but I just paid Connor and Courtney’s tuition, and I can’t really afford to buy Tiffany a new wedding dress, so would you mind if she wore it?”

  I stood there for several long moments, my mouth opening and closing wordlessly like a fish.

  “Ellie? Are you still there?”

  “If she so much as lays a finger on that dress, I will personally amputate her hand.” The venomous words stung my tongue. “You will put that dress in a box, and you will bring it to my house. Right now.” I hadn’t known I could sound like Regan from The Exorcist, but apparently I could. Trust Tiffany to find the one item I’d accidentally left behind.

  “Okay, okay. Don’t get your knickers in a twist. I was just asking.”

  The freshly brewed coffee I’d been enjoying threatened to make a reappearance. I had thought that I was dead to hope. That I’d accepted my new circumstances. And now I saw how little it took to resurrect my fantasies of a remorseful Jim who would come crawling back. Secretly, in my heart of hearts, I’d still believed he might change his mind. Now I knew better. Hope died swiftly and painfully within my chest.

  “I have a lawn to mow. You can leave the box on the front porch.”

  “Okay, okay. You don’t have to make a federal case out of it. I was just asking.”

  “Well, here’s my answer.” I slammed down the phone. This time, though, I wasn’t going to sink to the kitchen floor in tears.

  This time, I was going to go mow the damn lawn.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Length, Not Strength

  Being lethal to green things turned out to be an advantage when it came to cutting the grass. Several times I flooded the mower’s engine, but after a few false starts, the mower and I came to an understanding. With each strip of grass I cut, I fantasized that I was slicing off one of Jim’s body parts. By the time I finished, sweat dripping from every pore, the man was strewn in pieces around the backyard.

  I put the mower away, fixed myself a glass of iced tea, and went to check my front porch. Sure enough, there was a large white box, the one that contained my mother’s wedding dress. I hadn’t worn it when I married because my mother had wanted me to have something more expensive than the homemade, tea-length frock her mother had sewn for her, but I’d been saving it for Courtney in case she wanted to wear it. The thought of Tiffany in my mother’s dress sent shivers of revulsion up my spine all over again.

  I was putting the box on the shelf in the top of my closet when the phone rang again. Honestly, if it was Jim, I was going to get the spade Grace had given me, drive to our old house, and commit homicide with it.

  “Hello?” The word came out more like a bark than a greeting.

  “’Ello? Is this Eleanor Hall?” The smooth, mellifluous voice dropped the “h”s in the way only a Frenchman could.

  “Yes, this is she. Monsieur Paradis?”

  “Please, you must call me Henri.”

  He sounded just like Louis Jourdan in Gigi, and his voice was enough to make a woman’s stomach flutter and her toes curl. If sex had a voice, it would sound like Henri Paradis.

  “Of course, Henri. I’m delighted to hear from you.”

  Was that the faintest trace of coquettishness in my voice? I hadn’t known I still had any left. I’d thought it had worn away with motherhood and middle age.

  “Your friend Jane speaks so highly of you, and I am in great need of your help,” Henri practically purred. Or at least, that’s how it sounded to my American ears. No wonder French women fell into torrid love affairs the same way I fell into a box of Twinkies.

  “What can I assist you with, Henri?”

  “Everything, I am afraid. But right now I have one pressing need.”

  “Yes?”

  “I have no one to accompany me to brunch today. Perhaps you would be so kind as to consider joining me? We can become better acquainted, and you will hear my whole tragic story.” The irony and self-deprecation in his voice was vastly appealing after my recent conversation with Jim, who lacked both those qualities to an alarming degree.

  “Brunch sounds lovely.”

  “You would not mind meeting me at the restaurant?” He named a favorite haunt of the Belle Meade set, one that I was as familiar with as the back of my hand.

  “No, I don’t mind meeting you there at all.”

  “In an hour, then?”

  “That would be fine.” Fine? I was dripping sweat from head to toe, my hair would require a mir
acle of biblical proportions to make it even halfway presentable, and I had no idea what I would wear. All those carbs had started to take their toll on my waistline, and as a result I could barely button, snap, or zip any of my clothes. Plus, I was likely to see scores of people I knew at the restaurant. People who had disappeared from my life since the divorce. I wonder if my arrival on the arm of a handsome Frenchman would suddenly render me less invisible.

  “Then I shall see you in an hour, Eleanor.”

  The way my name slid off his tongue sent a shiver down my spine. I hung up the phone, let a goofy smile take over my face, and gave myself a moment to fantasize. A handsome Frenchman, the kind my mother had warned me about all those years ago. Perhaps a little champagne. And all those former friends dying to know who he was. Sometimes the gods were, indeed, kind.

  I looked at the clock and realized I didn’t have time to stand around mooning over a man I hadn’t even met face-to-face. I had a business to launch and a number of former friends’ noses to tweak.

  Halfway through the drive to the restaurant to meet Henri Paradis, my fantasies dwindled away and the cold reality of what was at stake hit me. I called Jane on my cell phone.

  “What do I say?” I wailed in panic. “I don’t have a name for my business.”

  “Play it by ear,” Jane advised. “Whatever he needs done, that’s what you do. This could be a potentially very lucrative market, Ellie. Foreign businessmen have big expense accounts and no time to learn the ins and outs of life in Nashville. If you can make Henri happy, he’ll send his compatriots your way.”

  I sighed. Did I really have the chutzpah to carry this off? “Okay. You’re the Queen of Diamonds, you should know. I’ll do it.”

  Although I wondered if I would have the nerve. Could any service I provided really be valuable enough for me to make a living off of it? More than two decades of unpaid labor had definitely taken their toll on my sense of worth in the economic marketplace.