The Gardens of Covington

by Joan A. Medlicott

  Introductions and pleasantries exchanged, they stepped inside. Grace held Lurina’s arm and felt her shaking. Mike helped Ellie carry the gowns, and they spread the plastic bags across the Victorian sofa. Slim and well dressed in a simple gray pantsuit with an aquamarine silk ascot hanging across her shoulders and down almost to her waist, Ellie took a minute to brush auburn hair back from her oval face. Wide blue eyes took in the people, the house, everything. Her smile was sunshine. Grace liked her.

  The living room of Lurina’s farmhouse had been given a face-lift. Earlier, Hannah had polished all the heavy wood furniture: the tabletops, the arms of chairs, the carved umbrella stand, everything but the double-barrel shotgun. The mahogany sideboard glowed. Antique Tiffany table lamps sparkled. A pot of water with a dash of vanilla and cinnamon simmered on a low fire in the kitchen, filling the house with the faint hint of baking.

  With her long braid wound three times about her head and pinned securely, Lurina glowed. The flowered dress Grace had helped her select for this occasion smelled slightly of cedar, but Grace had dabbed a touch of her own light, fruity toilet water behind Lurina’s ears and on the inside of her wrists.

  The wedding dresses slipped easily from their plastic bags. Ellie held up the dress Grace had liked at first sight. “Amazingly, I had this in your size, six. Someone ordered it, and the wedding was canceled.” Ellie lifted the dress and turned it round and round so that Lurina could see the back, and the way the skirt swirled.

  The sleeves on the second dress were scalloped and trimmed in lace, and the neckline came to just below the neck with a binding of lace, and a lace bodice over satin. The Queen Anne collar on the third gown caused Lurina to laugh. “I seen a picture of an old-time queen dressed like that,” she said.

  “It’s called a Queen Anne collar,” Ellie said. “Some people like it very much.”

  ‘Too fancy for me,” Lurina said. Lurina chose the gown that was Grace’s favorite. “I likes the smooth feel of it.” She ran her fingertips tentatively along the satin, mumbling to herself, nodding her head, smiling.

  “Come on, Lurina, let’s try it on,” Grace said. They went into the dining room and shut the door.

  The dress fit perfectly. Mike brought the standing mirror down from upstairs and tipped it so Lurina could see all of herself. Her eyes grew wide, the largest Grace had ever seen them. “This ain’t Lurina,” she whispered. “It’s somebody’s fairy godmother.”

  “It’s lovely on you,” Ellie said.

  Lurina changed back into her clothes, and they hung the dress on the dining room door. “I want to keep it right here with me,” Lurina said.

  “Well, since it is your size, that’ll be just fine. If I’d had to order it, it would have taken weeks until you could have had it.”

  “I got one room with a window air conditioner. Pa’s room. Don’t go in there much, but it’ll keep the dress fresh and nice, won’t it?”

  “It will indeed.”

  “Should I hang it with cedar or mothballs?”

  “Neither. Just in the closet.”

  Hannah and Amelia had prepared cookies and lemonade. Mike passed the lemonade in gold-rimmed tumblers that Hannah had unearthed from an old pie safe in the kitchen. Ellie asked Lurina about the one-room school-house she had attended so long ago. She asked how many students there were, and was duly impressed when Lurina said she was marrying an old schoolmate. Grace appreciated the fact that Ellie spoke to Lurina without talking down to her, as so many folks did with older people. Grace wanted to hug her for her kindness and attention to her friend.

  Ellie chatted easily, asking when Covington was first settled, and by whom, and what did the settlers do? She wanted to see Cove Road and the ladies’ farmhouse. She was interested in P. J. Prancer’s hardware store. “When my grandparents emigrated from Lithuania in the 1880s, they had a small general store in New Jersey. My father was born in the apartment they lived in above the store.”

  Grace thought of her own grandparents, from Holland, traveling steerage on a ship to join cousins already farming in Canton, Ohio. Amazing country this America. She could think of no country where immigrants from so many diverse and distant nations had come together voluntarily, and in peace, to create a nation.

  “Grandpa Luke,” Lurina was saying, “his pa and ma done took the fever and died, so he hitched up a mule and come by his self from flatland down east of Raleigh. Covingtons were already here. Grandpa Luke staked out this land, a good piece apart. Good neighbors oughta be far off enough so as they can’t see their neighbors’ laundry.”

  Lurina related only one brief death story, about a drunken McCorkle who had tumbled off a bridge into a gully. “A goose drownder killed him, sure ’nuff.”

  Grace whispered to Ellie, “Flash flood. He drowned.”

  Amelia brightened momentarily, when she heard that Ellie enjoyed the theater.

  Finally, Ellie said, “I’ve loved every minute of this afternoon, and I’m so happy you found a gown you like, Miss Lurina, but I must go now.”

  Lurina started to push herself from her chair. “You come back and see me, now.”

  “Please, don’t get up on my account, I can show myself out,” Ellie said. “I’d love to come back.” She looked at Grace and smiled.

  Mike carried the other two gowns to her car, and they stood in a row like telephone poles, and waved from the porch until the Buick turned onto Elk Road and disappeared toward Mars Hill.

  38

  Television Arrives on the Scene

  Early the next morning, a highly agitated Lurina phoned Grace. “They want to put Joseph Elisha and me on some fancy television show. You talk to ’em, Grace. You tell ’em no.”

  “Who wants to do this?”

  “Don’t know the name. Some connivin’ woman from New York.”

  Grace wondered if Lurina had dreamed this. Then Grace recalled Amelia saying the wedding would make a great story for a television magazine show.

  “Did they leave a phone number?” she asked Lurina. But who had notified them, Grace wondered, and was it local or national television? Everyone in their small community knew about Lurina and Old Man’s upcoming wedding. Anyone could have made that call.

  Lurina’s voice, raised in agitation, struck her eardrum. “I hung up on ’em right quick.”

  Hours later, Lurina phoned Grace again. “Woman called again. Name of Jill. She must of thought I was stupid, kept trying to tell me my weddin’ was some important story, people all over the country’d be interested. I just kept sayin’ ‘No,’ but that woman, she wouldn’t shut her mouth, so I hung up.”

  “Did you get a number?” Grace asked.

  “What for?”

  She had barely hung up from Lurina when the phone rang again. Grace was busy getting ready to go to the theater in Virginia with Bob. But, these days, Amelia answered no phones, and Hannah was out in the greenhouse with Wayne, Grace picked up the receiver. A woman’s voice asked, “Is this Grace Singleton?”

  “Yes, and who am I speaking to?”

  “Jill Moran. Our network loved the story about Ms. Masterson and Mr. Reynolds getting married. It’s a marvelous story, so encouraging to folks who consider their lives over because they’re of a certain age.”

  “These folks here live quiet, private lives,” Grace said. “They don’t want to be interviewed by anyone, and they don’t want to be on television.”

  “So many people are hesitant, nervous at first, until we talk to them,” Jill said. “I assure you, Mrs. Singleton, we’d do nothing, absolutely nothing to embarrass the couple.”

  Unrelenting woman, Grace thought, realizing that she had no power to stop them from coming to Covington. What happens when they get here’s another story, she thought, and said into the phone, “I’m sorry, but Miss Masterson is adamant. She’s not interested in the publicity.”

  Grace hung up. Her face flushed and the pulse at her temples throbbed. Who in heaven’s name had created this problem? Who had called a nat
ional television show? “Amelia,” she called, sticking her head out of her bedroom door. “Where are you?”

  “Here, in my room.”

  “Can you come to my room, please?” Grace felt the anxiety of time pressure building in her. Bob would be here any minute now. They were driving to the Barton Theater in Abingdon, Virginia, two and a half hours north and east of Mars Hill, and they both hated being late for anything.

  Amelia’s depression was evident in her dull eyes, the faded muumuu she wore, and her snail-like walk. “What is it?” she asked, holding the railing.

  “Did you call a national television show about Lurina and Old Man?”

  “Goodness, no. We decided against that, remember?”

  “Well, someone did. Lurina had a call, and now they’ve called me.”

  Amelia didn’t care. Nothing interested her these days.

  “Some TV out of New York’s hell-bent on sending someone down here to interview whomever will talk to them.”

  “So what? You don’t have to talk to them.”

  “That’s right.” She studied Amelia’s face for a clue and found only blandness and indifference. “And, you didn’t call them?”

  Amelia stared at Grace. “I certainly did not. I’m not a liar.”

  “Please, Amelia,” Grace said. “I’m sorry. I know you’re not a liar. I’m agitated. The woman on the phone would not be put off, and Lurina’s incredibly upset. Bob will be here any minute now to get me.” Turning to her mirror, Grace snapped on a pair of silver clip earrings and dabbed on lipstick. She was ready now.

  “Who was on the phone and would not be put off?” Hannah asked from the doorway.

  Amelia shrugged, stepped behind Hannah, and headed down the hall toward her own room.

  When Grace told Hannah about the calls, Hannah rubbed her forehead. “It’s always something, isn’t it?”

  The television van arrived on a Tuesday. Lurina heard the tires and met them on her front porch, shotgun raised. Immediately they turned and rumbled back across the bridge. In hours everyone in Covington knew. Phones hummed. People were excited. Most were more than willing to be interviewed.

  The van ended up at Grace and Bob’s tearoom. Jill was pleasant enough, thirty-something, with shoulder-length honey-colored hair parted in the center. Grace watched Jill switch from one pair of glasses for reading, then back to another pair for distance, and wondered why she didn’t get bifocals.

  “It’s too good a story to let go.” Jill looked at them earnestly through her wire-rim distance glasses while nibbling the temple of her tortoiseshell reading glasses. “Everyone loves it at the office. So often stories come in about crime, kidnappings, things like that. People gobble up a sweet story with a happy ending, and this is one of them.” She shook her head, swept her long hair behind her ears. “Good stories are hard to get, folks involved are private, don’t want their lives disturbed, and I do understand that. So often, it’s the weirdos that want publicity.”

  “Would the old girl have shot us?” the young man accompanying Jill asked.

  “Her name is Miss Lurina Masterson.”

  “Would Miss Masterson have shot us?”

  “She’s a mean shot,” Grace lied, crossing her fingers behind her.

  “This is what we’d like to do,” Jill explained. On went the reading glasses. She bent over a sheet of paper on the table and made a few notes, then the wire-rim glasses were on, followed by the tortoiseshell glasses again. She looked intently from Grace to Bob. “Interview the groom, then Miss Masterson, then both of them. I’d prefer the interviews take place where they live, but we can do them anywhere, actually. Here, perhaps?”

  “Lurina and Old Man don’t want publicity,” Grace said.

  “Old Man? Is that what he’s called? Isn’t his name Joseph Elisha? Why is he called Old Man?” Jill leaned forward, eyes flashing with interest.

  Dissuading Jill proved impossible. The next day the van squirreled its way to the mountain fastness of Old Man and Wayne and found them digging silt out of trenches along their roadway. As neither was aware of the hullabaloo in Covington, the Reynolds men gave the occupants of the van a country welcome, and invited them for lemonade and Grace’s sugar cookies. Jill, as Wayne later told Hannah, was slow talkin’ for a Yankee, and real nice. Wayne showed them the Reynolds Cemetery, and told how Lurina had objected, then agreed, to rest next to Old Man, come the time. He gave them the wedding date. He told Jill how it was to be a fancy wedding with Lurina wearing a white satin gown, and how he would take Old Man to Asheville to buy a suit. They visited for over an hour, and Old Man invited them to come back real soon.

  The following day dawned cloudy, a perfect day for working in the greenhouse. Wayne went on and on telling Hannah about Jill. “Raised up on a farm, but she’s been a city gal too long, I reckon, ’cause she stepped right in the stream crossin’ it to see the piglets from Old Man’s prize sow.”

  Hannah’s mouth fell open. “They found you way out there. Don’t you know who they are?”

  “Sure. They’re from New York, and they do a weekly nighttime show on TV. They want to tell all about Old Man and Miss Lurina marryin’ up after all these years.” He smiled sheepishly. “ ‘Course they’re wantin’ to make it like Old Man and Lurina been boyfriend and girlfriend way back, which ain’t so. Guess it can’t harm no one.”

  Hannah shoveled soil into a container so fiercely that it spilled over the edge of the container. “Old Man agree to that?”

  “Didn’t agree or disagree. He’s gotta ponder things awhile.”

  “I can’t believe you, Wayne.” She waved the shovel at him. “You should have told Old Man to talk to Lurina first. She’s very upset and doesn’t want to be on television. Took her shotgun to them when they crossed her bridge.”

  He laughed. “Old Miss Lurina’s a pistol, ain’t she? Shotgun’s empty. Don’t even know how to load it. Besides, ain’t you noticed, Miss Hannah, Miss Lurina always says no to everything first? You gotta talk her into it.”

  “That’s true,” Hannah said. “But she seems adamant about not making a spectacle of herself on television.”

  “We could all be on television, Miss Hannah: me, and you, and Miss Grace, and Miss Amelia. Good publicity for the tearoom, Jill says, and for this plant business, and they’d hang Miss Amelia’s pictures so’s folks all over America could see ’em.”

  “A nice tidy package.”

  “Seems like a mighty fine idea to me.”

  “They did a good selling job with you, Wayne. If they do this show, then the entire United States will know about Covington. Lord, it will change, guaranteed. Talk about development.” She shook the container to settle the soil, and remained silent a moment or two. “Guess it’s just that I like things the way they are, Wayne. I’ve lived through too much change, too much progress in my lifetime.” Hannah scooped out a handful of soil, inserted a small plant, and pressed hard about its roots. “Peaceful here, not crime-ridden, no traffic to speak of yet, and lots of decent people.”

  “Poor folks too, Miss Hannah, back up in the hills, and uneducated,” Wayne said.

  Hannah looked at him. She had never thought of Wayne as being either personally ambitious or socially aware. She began watering the little plant, and spilled water on her shoes as she considered how to respond. “What do you want to do with your life, Wayne?”

  Reaching for another plastic container high on a shelf, Wayne said, “Used to think I didn’t want much, wife maybe, kids one of these days. Double-wide manufactured home to put us in.”

  Hannah recalled visiting in Wayne’s single mobile home and being impressed it was so spick-and-span.

  “And now?” She took the container from him. When she met Wayne he held no steady job, sported a variety of young ladies, and tore about the place in an old truck.

  “You ladies got me thinkin’ about my life. Miss Amelia’s off takin’ pictures, and Miss Grace has her a right pretty tearoom.” He waved his arms. “You and this h
ere greenhouse. Sellin’ it to me sure settled me down. Now Old Man’s gettin’ married. Probably move into Miss Lurina’s place, if she don’t mind the pigs. He ain’t gonna give up his pigs no how. Used to be, I just went along. Like you say, things change, Miss Hannah. Guess that’s life. That’s what Old Man says. One thing, I’m sure gonna miss Old Man up the mountain.”

  For an instant, Hannah felt an urge to pitch the plant she was working on to the floor and stamp on it. She had read recently about how in quantum physics, the observer changed the observed. This principle applied to people. Anthropologists, as observers of indigenous peoples, were also observed by those people, and both were changed. People rejected cities, relocated in rural areas or on island paradises, and wittingly or unwittingly they introduced the trappings of the culture they held in disdain. Everyone, observer and observee, newcomer and old-timer, everyone was affected, everyone changed. Were there pristine places left? Even remote and inhospitable islands like the Galdpagos drew thousands of tourists a year, trampling vegetation, perhaps dropping candy wrappers or film wrappers when guides were not looking. And here was Wayne explaining how she and her friends had influenced him and changed his view of things.

  Thinking of this, Max’s words of caution plagued her. Had she, by persisting in opposing Jake Anson, invited the ire of the community on herself, on Amelia and Grace? What right had she to attempt to impose her values on Anson? In these mountains, a man reigned supreme over his land, free to hold or dispose of it as he chose. Yet, she realized, she was getting in deeper all the time, haranguing folks, agitating Anson, and others. When she had last chatted with Max, he suggested that before she reveal information about an old graveyard, she contact an attorney. Already this matter, with phone calls, and flyers, and petitions, and posters, had cost her several hundred dollars.

  “You done with that plant, Miss Hannah?” Wayne asked, and Hannah’s mind flip-flopped back into the greenhouse. He relieved her of the pot and placed it on one of the shelves.