“She is really pissed,” Erin said.
“Not nearly as pissed as I am,” Berta said. Her tone was calm, but she gripped the table, a bad sign. “No one cleans up that mess.” She pointed to the wall. “Margo will come down and do it.”
“Can I still have my night lesson?” Annie asked.
Bob hesitated, but Berta spoke up. “Of course. Margo’s bad conduct shouldn’t interfere. You and Bob go ahead.”
“I think we should wait.” Bob was troubled. “Another time, Annie. Soon. But I want to talk with Berta. We’ve got to find a way to deal with this problem, and so far, our tactics aren’t working.”
“Margo is spoiled,” Annie said quietly. “She has to learn she can’t be so ugly to the people who love her. Why is she acting so awful?”
“She’s jealous of you,” Berta said. “For no reason. But enough is enough.”
Dinner was over. I gathered the dishes and took them to the sink. The person who cooked also cleaned up. House rules. I hurried, eager to get down to Cora’s before she prepared for bed. She was over seventy, though she didn’t show it, and she often turned in early to read.
“I’ll do the dishes.” Annie stood at my elbow, and I realized that we were close to the same height—I was only a couple of inches taller—strange since I viewed her as short and frail.
“It’s okay. It’s my night.” My resistance was also peculiar. I was eager to get to Cora’s and washing dishes wasn’t one of my favorite pastimes.
She took the stack of salad bowls and started running water in the sink. “I’ll take care of it. Go ahead.” She smiled. “Do you have a date?”
The thought of dating was so far from my mind that I smiled too. “Of course not. I’m really going to see Cora. I wouldn’t fib about a date.”
“Sometimes we protect others by lying. A date would be more fun.”
“I don’t have to lie, because there’s no one I’m interested in. Besides, lying isn’t a good habit.” And it was an easy one to fall into.
Annie’s smile hid a secret. “When we were in town, I saw that deputy checking you out. I thought he was going to wreck his cruiser, he was so busy watching you.”
“What deputy?” I had no idea what she meant.
“The tall one with the dark hair. You know, beautiful eyes, nice jaw, looked like he would be tall if he stood up. He was across from the library in his patrol car and he watched every move you made. It’s funny, because he was playing ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ on the radio, and he was so wolf-like when he watched you.”
I loved the Sam the Sham record, and I knew who she meant now. I was secretly pleased at her description of Mark Walton. He’d been several years ahead of me in high school, and I’d lost touch completely when I went to college. Mark was from a farming family, a hard worker with the most incredible hazel eyes with thick lashes. In the days when I’d crushed on him, I fantasized I saw my future in his gaze. Much water under the bridge since then, but he was still handsome. I’d seen him in his patrol car cruising the town, but he’d never seemed to notice me.
“How do you know he was looking at me?” Asking revealed my interest, but I couldn’t help myself.
“There was no one else coming out of the library. He was almost panting. Why don’t you ask him out?”
“That’s not the way things are done here in Coden.” Her idea shocked me. “Girls don’t ask boys out.” The pill had given women a lot of sexual freedom without the dire consequences of an unwanted pregnancy, but women were not the aggressors in a dating relationship. That would never happen in Coden. Playgirl and Cosmopolitan could advocate for sexual liberation all they wanted to, but Coden men had only one use for forward girls.
“You aren’t a girl, you’re a woman, and why shouldn’t you? If you want him, you should let him know.” Annie’s eyes held a dare, and I wondered if she was baiting me, and to what end.
“You have a lot of romantic chutzpa for a sixteen-year-old.” I meant to tease her gently in return.
“I’m not stupid. There’s no guarantee you’ll be around a week from now. Or a month. If you want him, you should grab him.” Her words carried a lot of heat. “Hey, I was only kidding you.” I put a hand on her thin arm and she bit her lip.
“Sorry. I’m a little sensitive. People don’t take me seriously because I look like a kid, but I see things. That deputy likes you. You should take the first step if he won’t.”
I nodded. “I’ll think about it.”
“Go see Cora. I’ll finish the dishes for you.”
“Okay.” Why argue against what I really wanted to do? “I’ll be back in an hour or so.”
Cora’s favorite spot on earth was her front-porch rocking chair. She’d been born on the cusp of a new century, and during her life, she’d seen the invention of cars, telephones, air conditioning, tractors—a total revolution in lifestyles. Her youth had been spent sitting on the front porch of the home she now occupied shelling peas, rocking, and talking with older female relatives and passing visitors. In those days, neighbors stopped by for a glass of lemonade or water on the way to town and back. Cora wasn’t one to dwell in the past, but she missed that connection to community. Things moved too fast for her now, though she didn’t complain.
I found her rocking and watching Shore Road, which seldom saw a car these days. After the Paradise Inn died, there was no reason to drive on Shore Road, which ultimately dead-ended into a bayou. Now that the Hendersons had arrived, Bob drove his sedan and Berta her convertible. I used their station wagon to haul the kids to the library, field trips, and sometimes to the Capri Theater in Mobile for a film. They were generous with the vehicles and had given me access to keys for all three.
“What brings you home?” Cora asked, rising to give me a hug. “Life is more exciting with those young Hendersons than here with an old woman. Or maybe you’re on your way to town to socialize with some friends your own age?”
“I love you.” I kissed her cheek and held her tightly. Cora was my rock. I owed her my college education and so much more. “I’m here to spend some time with you. I miss you.”
“What’s wrong?” She pointed to another rocker.
“Why do you think something’s wrong?” I asked.
“Your face tells everything, Mimi. Spill it.”
I told her about the defaced book and about the Petri garage fire. The news didn’t surprise her. “You knew, didn’t you?”
“Yes. Gossip travels fast in Coden. I heard it this morning before I left for work.” She rocked a little faster.
“What’s wrong?” Cora was upset.
“I just found out the fire marshal has decided it was arson. Someone deliberately burned Chad’s garage. Lucky the house didn’t catch.”
“Someone burned Mr. Petri’s garage? That’s terrible.”
“Chad said he heard something in the garage. He went out to check. He was struck on the head and pushed down. He’s lucky he got out alive. As it was, the trauma nearly did him in. He’s in the hospital in Mobile. I’ll stop by to see him tomorrow if he’s up to visitors.”
“Who would do such a thing? And why?”
Cora rocked a spell. The frogs and crickets sawed loudly in the marsh grass. Cora’s house was only a hundred yards from the water, only a mile from the Henderson place. It was possible that she bordered their land. I’d never thought to examine the boundary lines.
“It could be a prank. Young people don’t think things through. This might have gotten bigger than they expected.”
She had a point, but she was missing mine. I wondered if she was deliberately ignoring the parallels. “That Mr. Petri’s history book would be defaced and his garage—full of those books—would be selected at random for arson is sort of … convenient.”
“What are you getting at?” Cora asked.
I shook my head. I didn’t know what I was intimating. Why would anyone care about history books? “I feel like a conspiracy nut.”
Cora laughed. “Mayb
e we’ll learn more once the authorities finish processing the scene. Until then, best not to jump to rash conclusions.”
“There’s trouble in the Henderson house, too. I just thought you should know.”
“Is Margo still head-over-hills for young Cargill?”
“She seems determined. Berta and Margo are fighting, and Margo is acting like a real bitch. She says she and Andrew are going to join the Moonies.”
Cora chuckled. “That girl wouldn’t last four hours. Those Moonie kids work.”
“Margo’s obstinate.”
“She’ll outgrow Andrew in three weeks if Berta doesn’t push her into his bed. Back when I was a girl, I could be shamed into proper conduct. Today, children are rebelling. Push them too hard and you get the opposite of what you want. Birth control pills. Bah! If girls give it away free, the whole fabric of society will unravel. Consequences are what keep folks on the straight and narrow.”
Cora might be old, but she wasn’t naïve or a prude. It had occurred to me that she’d never had the traditional birds-and-bees talk with me. She’d assumed I would behave and value myself. Had I met someone who kissed me the way Andrew did Margo, I wonder how well-placed her trust would be. “Margo is determined to defy her parents. You’re right about that. Maybe you can make Berta see that. If she would just ease up.… Honestly, if they don’t quit bickering, I have a terrible feeling something awful is going to happen.”
“Don’t say that!” Cora got out of her chair so fast I was afraid she’d fall over.
I jumped up to steady her. “What in the world? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” She started into the house.
“What is it, Cora?” I grasped her elbow and held it. “What’s going on? This is more than Chad Petri being hurt or Margo and Berta bickering.” I examined her face. “What was in Chad’s book about Belle Fleur?”
“Belle Fleur has a troubled past, Mimi. Folks around here don’t talk about it. I read Chad’s book when he first had it printed, and I disagreed with some of the things he hinted at.”
“Like what?”
“The Desmarais family had a number of … issues.”
“What kind of issues?” I’d grown up in this community and heard only the stories of parties and perfume. Town history painted the Desmarais as a rather eccentric French family that came to Coden with a dream—to grow the flowers that would produce the world’s most exquisite perfume. They were town heroes of a sort. The gardens employed dozens of workers. Belle Fleur was a showcase, an attraction that rivaled some of the antebellum houses of Mobile. This was the first time I’d heard anything negative about the mansion.
Cora took off her glasses and rubbed them on her blouse. Her pale blue eyes seemed weak without the lenses. “I don’t know why you’ve suddenly decided to poke into the past of Belle Fleur, but I’d rather you hear this from me. There was talk of abuse. The daughter died very young. At sixteen.”
I could read Cora’s face as easily as she could mine. “She died, or she was murdered?” The word gave me a chill.
“That’s a harsh accusation, Mimi. All of this happened long ago. Before I was born. There’s no truth, only speculation, and Chad was wrong to speculate. I’m sorry he was injured, but I’m glad that book is gone. No one ever checked it out, but it was always there, waiting to stir up trouble.”
“Was Chloe’s death in Chad’s book?”
“No, well not the outright accusation. But there were hints at it. And as I remember, a number of photographs. The family was physically striking and very particular about the things said of them.” Cora fidgeted in her rocker. “I can only imagine how angry she’d be with me now for talking about this. She was a terror.”
“Who?” I was confused. Every member of the family was dead.
“Sigourney.”
“But no members of that family are alive today, right? Who else would care about rumors from ancient history? Every family has horse thieves, scoundrels, and champions. You act like a family member might sue or something.”
“Old habits, I suppose. Sigourney’s primary emotion was pride. Chloe was an only child. She died young, and Henri not far behind her. Sigourney lived to be an old, old woman.” Cora looked out toward the woods. “I was a teenager, and I was terrified of her. She was very mean. She’d walk in the grocery store with her cane and if a child got too close, she’d strike us.”
“And she was never arrested?” I was outraged.
“She was old and alone. People realized she was mentally unstable. Back in those days parents expected their children to be seen and not heard. We knew about her and we knew to keep out of her way. If she whacked us with her cane, it was our fault, not hers.”
I looked toward the woods. Dusk had fallen as we talked, and above the tree line the first star winked in the night. “When he gets out of the hospital, I’m going to take the kids to do an oral interview of Chad Petri. I hope he can remember about Belle Fleur.”
“Chad’s not rational about Belle Fleur. He might upset the children. I think this is a bad idea.”
“But it’s the history. It’s—”
“It’s an old man’s interpretation of history, and he was one of the children Sigourney was so mean to. Why spoil the joy of the house for the Hendersons? Once you open that door, Mimi, there’s no taking it back. And the house has nothing to do with the people who lived there, but the taint will linger.”
She was right. “I can come up with another oral history project, I suppose.”
“Why not talk with Si Bailey about the Paradise Inn? He has some wonderful photographs.” Her face softened. “You can see the old girl in all her splendor. She was a showplace, Mimi. I spent many an evening dancing until I wore holes in my hose.”
I could imagine it—the big band music, so romantic. Cora was a looker back in the day. She’d been in her thirties—close to Berta’s age. It somehow didn’t seem possible. I nodded. “That’s what we’ll do then.”
Cora sat back down in her chair, her face suddenly alert. “I think someone is in the bushes over there.” She pointed to the dense woods. “Do you see them?”
Night hid the fine details of the landscape. The woods were a black blur against a sky rapidly going dark. I couldn’t see anything, but Cora was not one to arouse fears without cause. “Shall I call the sheriff’s department?”
“Get the flashlight.”
She kept a powerful light near her bed. Storms often kicked the power off, and everyone along the shore kept emergency lights and good batteries. I fetched it and swung the beam into the woods. For a moment I picked up a pair of eyes, bright yellow. The creature stared at me, unafraid, almost as if it dared me to come and investigate. And then it was gone.
“Probably a coyote or stray dog,” Cora said, unruffled. “Go on back to the Hendersons.”
I didn’t want to leave her. She seemed suddenly old, vulnerable. “I can stay tonight with you. We can make popcorn and watch old movies.” I was homesick for the days before I went to college. I loved the Hendersons, but I was one of many in the household. With Cora, I was the only one. “Cora, did you tell Berta and Bob about the fire?”
“Chad Petri’s fire?” She was confused.
“No, the one … my parents.” It was hard to say it, even to her. She’d taken me in like a daughter and raised me after my own parents burned to death.
“Why does it matter, Mimi?” she asked.
“I don’t want them to pity me.”
“You don’t have to worry about that. No one who looks at you would ever pity you. You’re a beautiful girl, Mimi. Bright, responsible, talented. Your whole life is ahead of you. The Hendersons know the basics. No more or no less. But they see you as my granddaughter and a lovely, smart young woman. And that’s how we’ll leave it.”
“I love you.”
“Be off with you.” She swatted my arm. “I’m going to bed to finish my Taylor Caldwell novel. Wonderful writer.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’ll stop by tomorrow with some fresh vegetables from Munch’s garden.”
“Bring me a watermelon. A Shouting Methodist.” She laughed. “Those are the sweetest. And some tomatoes. And some okra and Vidalia onions.”
I laughed with pleasure. Cora loved her fresh vegetables, and it was a small thing to get for her. “I’ll do it.”
11
Annie was in the kitchen when I returned to the Hendersons. Donald and Erin sat at the table, schoolbooks open while Annie wiped down the counters. As she worked, she recited a poem:
“To all the little children, the happy ones and sad ones; the sober and the silent ones; the boisterous and glad ones. The good ones—yes, the good ones, too. And all the lovely bad ones.”
She hit the last words hard.
“Where did you learn that poem, Annie?” Erin asked.
“Oh, I can’t remember.” She winked at me. The children hadn’t seen me in the doorway yet.
Donald snorted. “That’s funny. You can’t remember where you came from, but you can remember a poem.”
“Do you want me to tell it?” Annie asked.
“Yes!” both children chorused.
There was a pause, and then she began in an intimate voice that boded a spook at the end.
“Little orphant Annie came to our house to stay, to wash
the cups and saucers and sweep the crumbs away.”
She put a lot of emphasis in her recitation, which I approved heartily of. Memorization and recitation had fallen out of favor in the public school system, but I used it with the Henderson children because I felt it exercised the brain and also taught confident public speaking. I waited outside the door, not wanting to interfere.
“An’ shoo the chickens off the porch,
an’ dust the hearth, an’ sweep.
An’ make the fire, an’ bake the bread,
an’ earn her board-an’-keep.”
“You don’t have to do that stuff, Annie.” Donald spoke with confidence. “Mama would never make you work like that.”
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