“I didn’t ask,” Delores said. “He wouldn’t have told me the truth, noways. We rode over there to Birmingham, and a fella in that car lot gave Darvis a wad of cash money. After that he had me to take him to the Trailways bus station, back over in Anniston. He give me my money, and I left him off.”
“Did you see where he went? Did he buy a bus ticket?” I asked.
“No ma’am,” she said emphatically. “Wasn’t none of my business. I come on back home after that. And I never did see my baby brother again.” She closed her eyes and started rocking.
Bella followed us outside to our car. “How about you?” I asked. “Do you know anything about your uncle’s whereabouts?”
“No ma’am,” she said somberly. Up close like this, she didn’t look as old as she had initially. Maybe in her early forties. Her face had a wistful expression. “I didn’t even know I had cousins. Whitney and Courtney. Down there in Florida. You reckon they’d take me to Disney World?”
49
“I’ll drive,” I told Austin. I needed to be in charge for a while. It was a little tricky, finding our way back to the Interstate, and it was good to concentrate on alternate routes and road signs instead of the even trickier matter of my mother’s whereabouts.
Austin drummed his fingertips on the van’s dashboard. “Well,” he said finally. “What do you think?”
“I think it’s tragic that a woman in her forties has never been to Disney World,” I said, staring straight ahead.
“No, I mean about Darvis Kane. He didn’t have your mother with him when he sold her car. What can that mean?”
“Lots of things. Maybe she was meeting up with him someplace in Anniston. The old lady said she didn’t hang around to see if he got on a bus. Or maybe he arranged to meet her someplace else. Or…” I let my voice trail off, not wanting to speak about the possibilities that were whirling around in my own mind.
“Maybe Jeanine didn’t know he took her car. Maybe he left her back in Madison. Maybe she really didn’t run off with Darvis Kane,” said Austin, ever helpful.
I pushed a strand of sweaty hair off my forehead. “That still leaves us with more questions than answers. Again. We still don’t know where my mother is, and we don’t know where Darvis is.”
Austin reached over and massaged my taut shoulder muscles. “Is this upsetting you?”
“No. Sort of. I don’t know. Maybe we should just let Daddy’s private detective sort it out.”
He clamped his hand down on my arm. “Private detective?”
I nodded. “Now that he’s started dating, Daddy has decided maybe he does need to have some answers about Mama. He told me Wednesday night that he’s hired another detective. Somebody from Atlanta. A real pro this time, he claims.”
“Keeley!” Austin said, looking peeved. “I can’t believe you’re just now telling me this. Who is it? Has the guy found anything out yet? Maybe we should get together and exchange information.”
I laughed. “Daddy didn’t tell me his name. Not that it matters, because we don’t have any real information, Austin. I think we really have hit a dead end this time.”
“What?” he screeched. “How can you talk like that? This isn’t a dead end. We just uncovered a really important fact. Darvis Kane was alone when he sold your mama’s car. And he probably took a bus from Anniston to wherever he was meeting your mother. All we have to do now is get the bus company to check their records and tell us where he went.”
I hated to rain on Austin’s parade, I really did. But it wasn’t fair to let him keep up with the fantasy that he was going to track down my mother after all these years, and everything would be peachy-keen. And it wasn’t fair to me either, to let that fantasy take root in my mind.
“What records?” I asked. “Twenty-five years ago, they didn’t have computers. Anyway, it was a bus station, not an airport. Have you ever actually ridden on a Greyhound bus? They don’t take down your name and address and Social Security number. You give them some cash, they give you a ticket, you get on the bus next to some stinky guy with a mullet hairdo wearing a Walkman.”
“It’s still an important piece of information,” Austin said sulkily.
I patted his knee. “You’re right. It is. When we get back home, I’ll tell Daddy to pass it along to his private detective. It could be the key that unlocks this whole mystery.”
“Now you’re patronizing me,” Austin said. “I can’t stand when people do that.”
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s talk about something else. Like where do you want to stay tonight? It’s at least seven hours to New Orleans. Should we find a motel, maybe in Mobile or Biloxi, or keep going to the Big Easy?”
“Either way, I miss Friday night in New Orleans.”
“It’s always Friday night in New Orleans,” I pointed out. “Okay. I don’t know about you, but I’d kill for a shower right about now. Let’s just take I-65 down to Mobile and spend the night there. We can have a nice dinner and get an early start to Biloxi in the morning. I wouldn’t mind touring an old antebellum plantation house either, if there’s one on the way to New Orleans. For research purposes. I’m not doing an exact historic reproduction at Mulberry Hill, but it always helps me to see the real thing.”
“It’s your party,” Austin said. “I’m just along to do the heavy lifting.”
“Not true. You get to do some of the driving too. And I need your design sensibility. You’re a man of many talents, Austin.”
“I’m an excellent detective too,” he said. “Despite what you think, we are making progress on finding out what happened to your mother. We’ve eliminated a lot of possibilities, and now there are just a few people left who we absolutely have to talk to.”
“Who?”
“That cousin of yours up in Kannapolis, mainly,” he said.
“Sonya Wyrick,” I said.
He nodded. “I found her. She’s still right there in Kannapolis.”
I stared at him. “Have you talked to her?”
“Sort of. A woman answered the phone at the house I called, but she hung up before I could even tell her what I wanted. I think she thought I was trying to sell her something.”
“She probably won’t talk to me either,” I said.
“Why are you being like this?” Austin asked, exasperated. “You’re such a defeatist!”
“Talking to people about Mama, it’s just really hard. I mean, it’s not like I’m dredging up happy memories, for them or for me. This was a scandal, and even though it all happened a long time ago, it seems like just about everybody in Madison would just as soon forget the name Jeanine Murdock.”
“But you wouldn’t,” Austin said gently. “And neither would your daddy. And if you won’t find out for yourself, find out for him. Don’t you think it’s about time these old secrets get aired out?”
“I guess,” I said. “But I don’t have a good feeling about this. There has to be a reason it’s been a secret all these years. And I just don’t think this is going to have a happy ending. That’s why I’m so reluctant to keep going. Somebody is going to get hurt.”
“Somebody already has been hurt,” Austin said. “You and your daddy. Probably a bunch of people you don’t even know have been hurt by your mother’s disappearance too. It can’t get any worse, can it?”
I’d been thinking about that too. All the awful possibilities. But in the end Austin was right. Daddy and I needed to know. Now. So we could get on with our lives, with or without Jeanine.
“All right,” I said finally. “I guess I wouldn’t mind seeing Sonya again. I know so little about Mama’s family, maybe she can fill in some gaps.”
“That’s my girl,” Austin said, beaming. “I’ll even go with you. And after we’ve caught up with cousin Sonya, we can go on up the road a little bit and hit the High Point furniture outlets. They have the most fabulous website. I’ve already checked it out. We can head up there, right after we’re done in New Orleans. I mean, we already have the truck, and I�
��ve got the week off to play. And best of all, we can do our little research and still write the whole trip off on Will’s dime.”
“You’ve been plotting against me,” I said.
“Somebody has to.”
50
We found a motel just off the Interstate in Mobile, and this time we got one room—with two queen-sized beds. I hit the showers while Austin went to forage for food. I was sitting on my bed toweling off my hair when he came in holding aloft two large paper sacks.
“That smells divine,” I said. “What is it?”
He smiled. “Cheeseburger in Paradise.” From one sack he unloaded two quart-sized Styrofoam cups. “Sweet tea.” I put mine on the nightstand. From the other came two foil-wrapped packages.
I unwrapped my sandwich. Cheese and bacon and what looked like a half-pound slab of ground beef slopped over the sides of a huge bun. “It’s got lettuce and tomato too,” Austin said. “So it hits all your basic food groups.”
Delicious. And there were fries too. We sat on our beds and ate like a couple of pigs, and then Austin took a shower, and we watched HGTV in our pajamas until I heard the sound of gentle snoring coming from the other bed. So this was what my life was like.
I was sacked out in a cheap motel in Mobile, Alabama, on Friday night, eating junk food and watching cable TV in bed—with a gay man. All right. I decided that was fine with me. Austin was fun. He liked the things I liked, he could move heavy furniture, and as a bonus, there was very little probability that he would end up screwing my best friend in the boardroom of my father’s country club.
In the morning Austin declared that we would have only a “petite de jeuner” as he put it—which meant a Diet Coke for me and black coffee for him. “But I’m hungry now,” I said.
“Wait!” he said, trying to sound mystic. “And you will be rewarded.”
After breakfast we went looking for antiques stores. And then it occurred to me that it was Saturday. So we hit the flea market out on Schillinger Road.
“Let’s split up,” I told Austin. “You take one end, I’ll take the other. If you see anything good, call me on my cell phone.”
“Exactly what are we looking for?” he asked.
“We still need dining room furniture, sofas for the twin parlors, bedroom furniture, and stuff for the breakfast room,” I said. “Paintings, prints, all that kind of stuff. And remember, keep it cheap. Gorgeous, but cheap.”
“Like me,” Austin said, giving me a wink and heading toward a distant row of dealers.
It was hot and the going was slow. I waded through a lot of ratchet sets and garage sale rejects, but finally managed to strike gold when I caught a dealer unloading the truck he’d backed up to his space. He had it in his arms, and I was happy to lighten his burden. It was a perfectly swell wicker porch swing. Probably 1920s, Bar Harbor style. In mint condition, and best of all, it had never been painted. I could already see it hanging on the veranda outside the breakfast room at Mulberry Hill.
“How much?” I asked, trying not to admire my find. He tilted the bill of his baseball cap to take my measure. I was dressed in khaki shorts and a red tank top, with the twill fishing vest I always wear to flea markets—the pockets are great to stow money, car keys, checkbooks, and my notebook. My hair was twisted into a ponytail poked through the back of my own baseball cap. No makeup. No jewelry.
“Five hundred,” he said. I started to walk away. “Hey,” he called. “I was just kiddin’.” I walked back and stood there, not saying a word. “This is from a house down at Bay St. Louis,” he said. “I can’t hardly find these anymore.”
“It’s lovely,” I said. “What’s your friendliest price?”
“Friendly?”
“Dealer price,” I said. “I’m on a pretty tight budget. What can you do for me?”
He shook his head, wounded. “Two-fifty.”
I started to walk away again, praying he would call me back. I got all the way over to the next booth, where I pretended to be fascinated with the ugliest 1960s pole lamp I had ever seen. When I looked up, he was standing there.
“I know you?” he asked.
“Don’t think so,” I said. “I’m from Georgia.”
“Good,” he said. “’Cuz if it gets out around here I’m selling for these prices, I’ll be out of business in a month. Hundred fifty, and that’s it. I got more than that in it.”
I knew he probably only had about seventy-five dollars in it, but that was okay. The swing was a Stephanie piece. I could already see her curled up in it, with Will’s arm around her, and Erwin in her lap, barking at an errant squirrel.
I paid the dealer and promised to come back for the swing. I moved down the rows of booths quickly, letting my gaze bounce back and forth with no particular thing in mind.
At the end of the same row where I’d found the swing, I hit pay dirt again. The dealer had it covered with stacks and stacks of mismatched Franciscan china, but I could tell just from the chunky one-column leg profile that it was what I needed. A mahogany Empire dining room table.
I circled it warily, moving the china about to get a good look at the tabletop. There were some scratches and gouges, but that could be fixed by my refinisher. I looked around the booth until I found what else I needed—the leaves. There were three more leaves in all, which I estimated meant the table could seat eighteen. This table could be just the thing. If I waited until I got to New Orleans, I might find a slightly better one at one of the shops on Magazine Street. For over five thousand dollars.
I found the dealer sitting in a lawn chair, reading the Sunday Mobile Register.
“The table,” I started. “I don’t see a price.”
“Four hundred,” she said, not bothering to look up. “Don’t ask me where it come from, and don’t expect me to clear it off or help you load. It’s four hundred. Cash. No checks.”
I reached into my vest pocket and started peeling off twenties. She held her hand up, I gave them to her. “Are there any chairs to go with it?” I asked.
“No,” she said, still fascinated with the newspaper. “And I’m leaving at two. If you’re not here by then, tough.”
Always a pleasure doing business with a people person, I thought.
I wandered around enjoying my bargain buzz for a while, and was contemplating food when my cell phone rang.
“It’s me,” Austin said breathlessly. “I might have found something.”
He gave me directions, and five minutes later we were standing in front of a table stacked with pictures—oil paintings, watercolors, and a large stack of pen and ink architectural drawings.
With a flourish he pulled out a spectacular portrait. It was an oil painting, probably five feet wide, of a pensive-looking pair of children, dressed in nineteenth-century finery. The little girl cradled a kitten in her lap, the little boy held what looked like a top. It had a magnificent carved gilt frame, a tiny tear in the lower left corner, and a signature in the lower right corner. I whipped out my magnifying glass for a better look. Jacques Amans. I was fairly sure he was a listed artist, but it wouldn’t matter. The painting was perfect for the dining room.
“How much?” I whispered.
“No prices on anything,” he whispered back.
The dealer was standing at another table, extolling the virtues of a bad twentieth-century English watercolor to a couple who were dressed for brunch at the country club.
He wore a T-shirt stretched tight over a not-so-tight belly, and the writing on the back said “I Buy Art!”
“Excuse me,” I said, tapping him on the shoulder.
He turned and gave me a sharp look. I was a pro, I could take it. “The portrait of the children. It’s really charming. How much?”
“The Jacques Amans?” he asked.
Uh-oh. So it was a listed artist.
“It has some slight damage,” I said. “A tear in the canvas.”
“A minor repair,” he said. “Cost you a hundred bucks to have it restored.”
“And some chips in the gilt,” I added.
“It’s the original frame,” he said, glaring at me. “An Amans went up at auction at the St. Charles Gallery in New Orleans this spring and brought six thousand dollars.”
“But this is a flea market in Mobile. Your painting has a tear and the gilt is chipped, and it’s Saturday afternoon,” I said sweetly. “And I’m a dealer.”
He shrugged. “Say twelve hundred.”
“Say nine hundred.”
He looked around his booth. It was still stacked high with merchandise, and it was, as I’d already pointed out, only a few hours away to quitting time. And I did look pretty fetching in that fishing vest and baseball cap.
“Gimme a break,” he said.
I took out my checkbook and held my pen poised above it. “You’ll take an out-of-town check with ID, right?”
I fairly danced away from the booth, but waited until we’d gone a prudent distance away to set my painting down carefully and give Austin a huge hug and a big wet kiss.
“You’re a genius,” I told him. “I’d just finished buying the dining room table. It’s heavy mahogany, Empire, will seat eighteen. For only four hundred bucks. And now this painting! It’s worth at least four times what we paid for it, maybe more. Austin, it’s absolutely the right thing for that room.”
“I know,” he said simply. “I’m gay, remember?”
We decided we’d had enough triumphs for the day and went back around to collect our prizes. I paid a porter to help us load the table, and by noon we were cruising the streets of Mobile, looking for the promised perfect lunch.
“What’s the place called?” I asked, craning my neck for any sign of a restaurant.
“I don’t want to tell you until I see it,” he said. “It’ll spoil the surprise.”
I slowed the van to a creep, and when I saw the sign I knew I’d found what we were looking for. “The Tiny Dinee?” I yelped. “For real?”
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