The Chili Queen: A Novel

by Dallas, Sandra

  Emma cleared her throat. “Brother John,” she began, then lowered the paper and explained to Addie, “He’s as economical with words as he is with money. He wouldn’t like anything flowery.”

  Addie nodded.

  Emma raised the paper so that it was close to her nose, and Addie wondered if she had bad eyesight. Perhaps she was too vain to wear spectacles, but anyone as plain as Emma wasn’t likely to be vain. Addie was glad her own sight was still so sharp she could see a knothole in the barn door fifty feet away.

  “Brother John. You will be glad to know that marriage suits me. My husband is like you, plainspoken and hardworking, and he saves his money. He suits me, too.”

  “Why’d you say that?” Addie asked.

  “So John will trust him,” Emma replied. “If I said he was handsome and made me happy, John would think my mind had gone weak. John doesn’t believe in love.”

  Addie knew the type well enough. “Go on.”

  Emma cleared her throat. “You said upon my departure to keep an eye out for investment. I believe I have found one, and so I have written to you. My husband has the opportunity to purchase 20,000 acres adjacent to his ranch for $11,500 cash. It is good cattle range, worth almost twice that, but as it cannot be reached except through my husband’s property, the market for it is limited, and the owner is willing to sell it cheap.” Emma smiled at Addie. “I thought that was good reasoning.”

  Addie didn’t reply, and Emma ducked her head and continued. “Mr. Withers would buy it himself, but he does not have all the money. Here is what he proposes: You and he will each put up half the cash. Mr. Withers will run cattle on the land. He will charge you for your half of the calves but defer payment until the cattle are sold. Then he will deduct the cost from your share of the sale price as well as the five percent you promised me if I should find you a suitable investment. As an act of good faith, he will not charge you interest on the calves, nor for your share of the operations for the first three years. I believe it is a fair arrangement for both of you. You said my husband would think better of me if I showed a good head for business, and I desire his good opinion—as I do yours. Time is of the essence, as there is talk in town that minerals have been discovered just across the river from the land in question, and we believe if the owner hears the news, he will raise the price. The law requires access be given where mineral rights are concerned. I made that up. John wouldn’t know otherwise,” Emma said, not looking up. “Send your money order to me in care of general delivery. I am residing in a respectable ladies’ boardinghouse in town while Mr. Withers completes the house he is building for me. You may trust me.

  “Very respectfully,

  “Your sister

  “Emma Roby Withers.”

  “I still don’t know why he’d trust you,” Ned said.

  “Oh, you don’t know him. He’s a fool to make money. It clouds his judgment,” Emma said. Then she added, “I believe John would consider it a blot on his character to think his closest kin would cheat him.”

  Ned shrugged. “Maybe so.”

  But Addie knew men like that, and she nodded her approval of the letter. She watched as Emma took out another sheet of paper and began to write the final draft. Addie produced a two-cent stamp from a drawer in the cupboard and set it on the table.

  “I’ll take it in to the post office in the morning,” Emma offered when she had finished the letter, folded it to form its own envelope, and put the stamp on it.

  Addie didn’t want to risk Emma having second thoughts. “Welcome will put it in the postbox tonight. Come on in here, Welcome,” she said in a quiet voice. For some reason Addie felt comfortable knowing that the servant was always lurking nearby, as if she were protecting her. In a few seconds, the back screen opened and Welcome entered the room noiselessly. Without a word, she took the letter and put it into her apron pocket. Then she turned around and went back out, and Addie watched through the kitchen window as Welcome took long strides down the dirt road and disappeared in the darkness.

  Three

  Miss Tillie and Miss Belle had tromped off to the saloons, telling Addie they didn’t care to tarry with a woman who looked just like an old-maid schoolteacher, not that they knew much about teachers since neither had ever been to school. Welcome was hanging up the wash on clotheslines stretched between the barn and the privy. Emma fussed with the cinnamon-rose starts she had planted all over the backyard. She was as tender with the roses as if they were her children, and every hour or two she watered them. Addie sat in a straight chair in the shade on the back porch, fanning herself, watching Emma as she carried a heavy bucket of water with one arm; the other arm was outstretched to balance herself. Emma had earned her keep, all right. Addie had to hand her that. In the five days she’d been at The Chili Queen, Emma had taken a working fit. She had scrubbed the parlor carpet, sewn curtains for the kitchen windows, weeded Welcome’s garden, and repaired the broken window in the bedroom. Whenever she sat down, she picked up her piecing and had completed half a dozen quilt squares. Still, Addie couldn’t shake the feeling that something wasn’t quite right with Emma. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but it made her nervous. “That woman’s busier than a two-tailed cat. It makes me tired just to look at her,” Ned observed. He was sitting on the edge of the porch next to Addie, his feet planted in the dirt, his elbows resting on his knees. Neither one of them had moved in the past hour.

  Addie resisted telling him that everything seemed to make him tired. “You ever hear such a thing as rosebushes at a house of joy?” she asked instead. “Next, she’ll put out a fountain and an iron dog.”

  “Might look nice. My sisters always planted flowers at home on the farm,” Ned said, “You could name the dog Rio. I had a dog named Rio once. He was a shaggy black-and-white dog about this big.” Ned put out his hand even with his knees.

  Addie looked at him curiously. “I never heard you talk about home before, except to say you were glad you left it.”

  “I am glad.” Ned didn’t look at her but kept staring straight out into the yard. “I guess I never thought much about it before. I’d like to see Rio again. I suppose he’s dead. He’d be twenty-five years old if he wasn’t.”

  “What made you think about those way-back days?” Addie put down her paper fan and found a handkerchief, which she balled up to mop her neck. She reached inside her dress to dry her shoulders and bosom. “You could fry eggs on me, I’m that hot.”

  Ned turned to watch her and grinned as she held the front of her dress open and flapped it back and forth to push the air inside. “Maybe it’s because I just got me a sister I never knew I had.”

  “Get me a drink of water, will you?”

  Ned stood up and walked lazily to the well. You could whistle a chorus of “Listen to the Mockingbird” in the time it took him to lift one foot, set it down, and lift the other. Ned drew a bucket of water and scooped out a dipperful, sloshing the liquid over the sides as he carried it back to Addie. She drank and handed the dipper to Ned, who sipped, then carefully poured the rest of the water over a rosebush Emma had planted alongside the house. “I wish you hadn’t told her we were kin. I never knew you to have an attack of respectability before.”

  Addie picked up the fan and swished the hot air. She didn’t know herself why she hadn’t set Emma straight, and she was a little surprised the woman hadn’t figured out how things stood. Or maybe she had and kept her mouth shut for fear Addie would demand she give up the bedroom. “When you busted in like you did Sunday morning, she thought this was a boardinghouse. Maybe I didn’t want her thinking I was sleeping with an outlaw. I got my pride, you know.”

  “Oh, zam, Addie! When did you ever care about pride?” Ned sat down again. “You ought to tell her now. You and me could take back the bedroom.” He raised an eyebrow.

  Addie thought that over. There was nothing she’d like better than a sweet time with Ned. He was an uncommon handsome man. Just looking at him with that little smile on his mouth and hi
s green eyes that slid over her then made her insides feel like a caramel candy left in the sun. There’d been plenty of men in Addie’s life before, and she’d loved some of them pretty good, but none the way she did Ned. La! He was easy on the heart.

  Addie felt a hammering inside her the first time she saw him, and he was smitten, too. She’d opened the door of The Chili Queen, and there he was. After she’d looked Ned up and down to take in all of him, Addie had invited him inside. She hadn’t had to remind him of his manners, asking, “Won’t you rest your hat?” the way she did most of the cowboys, because Ned had removed his hat as he came through the door. She’d ushered him into the parlor and introduced him to the girls, but he hadn’t even looked at them. Instead, he’d sat on the sofa and talked to Addie. Whenever a customer arrived, Ned sat politely while Addie introduced the man to one of the girls, took his money, then returned to Ned. When the last customer left, Ned went into Addie’s bedroom with her and had been coming back to The Chili Queen ever since. That was four years ago. He was always welcome, whether he stayed a night or two or for weeks at a time. He hadn’t paid the first night, and Addie had never asked him for anything since. She let him be a loose horse, going where he wanted to, and always welcomed him back. She never asked where he’d been, although she usually knew. In fact, she sometimes suggested robberies, picking up information from customers who talked too much. Of course, Ned did the planning and pulled off the jobs. And it didn’t bother him that Addie earned her living running a parlor house, either. He never looked down on her, never reproached her for sleeping with other men. There was something to be said for that.

  Ned, of course, was the reason Addie wouldn’t have married the man in Kansas City, even if he had asked her. She’d thought plenty about marriage on the trip home, however, although she and Ned had never talked about it. She’d told Ned once about her idea of going back to San Antonio and setting up a chili operation, perhaps opening a restaurant. Maybe if she could get the money to make the move, Ned would go along—as her husband. She’d take care of him. Ned wouldn’t have to find work, unless he wanted to, and Addie was pretty sure he didn’t. He was tired of being on the run and had begun talking about settling down with the money from his last robbery. He’d taken a little more than five thousand dollars, and he hadn’t let it get away from him this time, either. At least that was what he’d told her. Addie’d never seen the money, never knew where Ned hid it. The only problem that Addie could see was that she didn’t know if Ned wanted to marry her. Maybe leaving him out in the barn by himself at nights would make him realize how much he wanted to be with her. No, Addie wouldn’t tell Emma she and Ned were lovers.

  “She won’t be here for long, just until her brother sends her that money,” Addie said. “Besides, where else would she sleep? She can’t stay upstairs in Frankie’s room, and I don’t suppose she’d sleep in the barn. I guess if you get bothered, you could come here like a regular customer.”

  And ask for Belle? Ned asked, but Addie had shifted her attention to the road. Two men were riding slowly toward The Chili Queen. One of them pointed at Emma, who had her foot on a shovel, digging a hole. The men laughed and rode on. “Look at that.” Addie frowned. “She’s given me a hurting. Men see her and think she’s one of my girls. No wonder my business has slowed down.”

  “It’s always slow in the middle of the week. You’ve said it yourself,” Ned said. “Besides, the cowboys at the Rockin’ A are digging postholes. You won’t see those boys until Saturday night.”

  “No, it’s that woman,” Addie insisted. “She’s doing first one thing and another, and if she doesn’t stop her foolishment, she’ll crochet a mat for the front door with ‘Welcome, Jesus’ on it.” Addie stopped fanning herself and leaned toward Ned. “At night, she stays to her room, but in the day, she’s outside working in the garden or sitting right here in this chair where everybody can see her. She works her quilt, just like this was an old-ladies’ home. She even asked me if I had a rocking chair she could bring out.” Addie had worked herself into a bad mood.

  “I wouldn’t mind a rocking chair to sit on,” Ned said. Addie swatted him, and he added, “We’ll just have to wait her out. You said it will be only a week, two at most. It’s not as if I can do something about it.”

  “Maybe not,” Addie said, thinking it over. “Or then again, maybe you can. It’s about time you earned your keep.”

  Ned looked up suspiciously. “Now, don’t go and spoil a fine thing,” he warned.

  “A fine thing for you,” Addie retorted, then held her tongue. She’d always done for herself, never suggested Ned nail up a clothesline or fix the broken hinge on the wardrobe. That was one of the reasons he loved her. She was different from other women. Ned was a man who didn’t like to be needed. If he helped out, it was because he wanted to. But this wasn’t a job Addie could do herself or hire done, like stringing barbed wire or whitewashing the kitchen. This was something nobody but Ned could do. “You just look at her out there talking to Welcome. She’s in everybody’s way.” Addie took a deep breath and said, “I want you to take her out days.”

  Ned chuckled.

  “I mean it.”

  “Aw, Addie.”

  “I want you to get her out of here.”

  Ned stood up and went behind Addie, putting his arms around her and kissing the tip of her ear. “Now, honey, you settle down. Before you know it, she’ll be gone, and except for those roses, which you are going to like when they bloom, and two hundred and fifty dollars you didn’t have before, you won’t even remember she was here,” he said.

  Addie leaned against Ned, then thought better of it and straightened up. A few days with Emma was likely to make him even more appreciative of Addie. “Don’t you sweet-talk me. I got a business to run, and I expect you to do your part.”

  Ned began to massage Addie’s neck and shoulders. “What am I supposed to do with her, take her to church?”

  “If it suits you. But Sunday isn’t for three more days. We got between here and then. You take her for a buggy ride.”

  “For three days?” Ned pinched the fat on Addie’s plump arm, and she winced.

  “Every day until that money comes.”

  “What if she doesn’t want to go?”

  “I expect you’d know how to make her want to.”

  Ned took his hands away from Addie’s shoulders and leaned against a post. The two of them didn’t say more because Welcome came across the yard and set her big wicker laundry basket on the porch, sitting down straggly-legged next to it. “I got the wash done up, unless she finds something more dirty.” Welcome nodded her head at Emma. “She’s wore me out good.”

  “The way she works is a caution, all right,” Addie said.

  “You could wash my shirt,” Ned said, straightening up and starting to unbutton the front. “And polish the buttons. I had it brightened up with brass buttons, but they got dull.”

  “I don’t do for you,” Welcome said.

  Ned frowned and looked at Addie, but she only laughed and said, “I don’t do for you, either, because you don’t do for me. You want your buttons shined up, you can mix up salt and vinegar and polish them yourself.” Then she turned to Welcome. “Ned wants to shine himself up to take Emma over there on a buggy ride.”

  Welcome narrowed her eyes at Ned. “How come you was to have tarry with her?”

  “’Cause I said so,” Addie said. “I got to get her out of here before she kills my business dead.”

  “I could keep her patching around the place, and maybe find her more work to do in the garden,” Welcome offered.

  The garden had been Welcome’s idea. She had planted it the day after she’d arrived, and while Addie thought a vegetable garden had no more place at a whorehouse than rosebushes, she’d changed her mind when Welcome brought in the first weedings of lettuce. Addie wondered if Welcome had been a field hand during slavery—she’d seen scars on Welcome’s powerful arms and one shoulder when the woman was bent ov
er the scrubboard—or perhaps, like other Negroes Addie had known, Welcome was always a little worried about where her next meal would come from. But then Addie’d been worried about that a time or two herself. “Emma’s already tended to the garden. You shouldn’t have planted it if you couldn’t care for it yourself.”

  Welcome shrugged. “I’m satisfied with what confronts me.” She stood up. “Gimme that shirt. I’ll go mix up the salt and vinegar.”

  Ned removed his shirt and handed it to Welcome, who looked him over and laughed.

  “What’s so funny?” he asked.

  “You look part Negro. You got a white chest on you and hands and a neck as dark as me. That makes you half black and half white.”

  Ned didn’t say anything, but went off to the barn for a clean shirt. Addie laughed however, and said, “I guess I never minded a man that was half black and half white.”

  Welcome, who had been watching Ned, slid her eyes around to Addie and muttered, “That’s packs of trouble.”

  “Well, I guess you’d know,” Addie replied.

  “I guess I would,” was all Welcome said. She put the basket on her hip and went inside, muttering, “Lord have mercy on me, yes.”

  Addie sat on the back porch, fanning herself, until Ned reappeared, dressed in a white shirt. He’d put on clean pants, too, and his boots looked as if he’d shined them. He went to the well and poured water over his head, slicking back his hair with his fingers. Then he ambled over to Emma and said something to her. Emma looked startled, studied on it, then smiled and nodded. As Emma started toward the house, she smoothed her hair, then rolled down her sleeves. Suddenly, Addie felt a twinge of jealousy and wished she were the one who was going off for a buggy ride with Ned. Maybe she hadn’t been so smart after all. Before Emma could reach the house, Addie got up and went inside. “Here,” she told Welcome. “Give me that shirt. I’ll polish the buttons.”