The Darling Dahlias and the Confederate Rose

by Susan Wittig Albert

  “I thought Coretta was a friend of Verna’s,” Violet said.

  “Obviously not.” Myra May’s mouth tightened. “You don’t treat a friend like dirt, the way Coretta is treating Verna. But five will get you ten that she won’t be in Verna’s job for long. She is totally disorganized. She’ll make a mess of that office in nothing flat.” Myra May had met Coretta when they both volunteered to run the Children’s Day program at the park for the Darling Ladies Club. Myra May had ended up doing most of Coretta’s work.

  “She’s probably thrilled to be working full time again,” Violet said softly. “I heard from Mrs. Musgrove at the hardware store that Coretta’s husband got laid off out at the Coca-Cola bottling plant. The Coles have two kids in high school. I’m sure they’re hard up for money.”

  “You’re too softhearted, Violet. Everybody’s hard up for money. And it’s no excuse for being underhanded. Why, Verna taught Coretta all she knows about that office. And now Coretta is taking Verna’s job!”

  This wasn’t a wild guess. Myra May and Violet had pieced together what they knew about the situation from several overheard phone conversations, going back to the previous Thursday.

  It had started with a call from the state auditor to Mr. Tombull, chairman of the board of county commissioners, at Tombull’s Real Estate, out at the end of Dauphin. Violet had to stay on the line at the beginning of the call because Mr. Tombull couldn’t be found right away. She needed to be sure he was available, so that she could connect the two parties. When he finally came on the line, slightly winded, the auditor announced right off the bat that there was a fifteen-thousand-dollar discrepancy in the county treasurer’s accounts. This announcement was so shocking that Violet didn’t stop listening, the way she was supposed to. Unashamedly, she eavesdropped on the rest of the conversation.

  The auditor said he had sent Mr. Tombull a report of the missing funds, which had been turned over to Cypress County by the state of Alabama from the gasoline tax, to be used for road and bridge upkeep. The letter accompanying the report said that the county should begin its own investigation immediately.

  “When a situation like this happens,” the auditor said, “we usually leave it up to the county to decide how it should be handled—that is, whether or not to bring in the local law enforcement. But we do expect that it will be dealt with expeditiously and the culprit brought to justice as soon as possible.” He had paused, cleared his throat, then added in an even sterner voice, “It goes without saying, Mr. Tombull, that there will be a full restitution of funds. This is the gasoline tax fund.” From the tone of his voice, it sounded as if the money were sacred.

  “Oh, of course,” Mr. Tombull had replied, obviously caught off guard by this unexpected turn of events but attempting to cling to his dignity and authority. “We’ll get the person who did this. And oh, yes, sir. Full restitution. Of course, of course.”

  Myra May was as astonished as Violet when she learned this news. Luckily, she was on the switchboard when the next call went through, no more than an hour later, from Mr. Tombull to Earle Scroggins. Mr. Tombull was as irate as a mule with a mouthful of bumblebees.

  “How’d you let this happen, Earle?” he demanded. “We figgered you knowed what you was doin’ with those dang accounts. First I’ve heard about this-here audit, too. Whyn’t you tell me ’bout it when it happened, ’stead of lettin’ me hear it from the state auditor?”

  But that was as much as Myra May got to hear at that moment, because Nona Jean Jamison wanted to talk long distance to Chicago, which meant that Myra May had to route the call through Montgomery, Nashville, Memphis, and then to Chicago, which took four or five minutes.

  By the time she got back to Mr. Tombull and Mr. Scroggins, Mr. Scroggins was saying, touchily, “I said I’d handle it, Amos, and I will. O’ course, I cain’t rightly guarantee anything about the money. Restitution, I mean. But I’ll do the best I can to get to the bottom of this and see it’s made right, far as I’m able. You can count on that.”

  “You better, Earle,” Mr. Tombull growled. “You hear me? You jes’ better do that.” He paused. “The other commissioners are gonna need to know about this. And what about the law? I’m thinkin’ we oughta get Sheriff Burns in on it from the start. That way, there ain’t no question.”

  There was a long silence. “Well,” Mr. Scroggins said, “how ’bout you let me see what I can do first, Amos? We can always bring the sheriff in later, if’n it turns out we need the law.” He gave a meaningful cough. “Best thing ’ud be to handle it without the newspaper gettin’ wind of it, wouldn’t you say? Long as we can, anyway. Charlie has got a dickens of a nose for news, if you get my drift.”

  Mr. Scroggins laughed as though that were funny, but Myra May noticed that Mr. Tombull didn’t laugh at all. Instead, he said, “I’m also thinkin’ you oughta mend a fence or two with Charlie Dickens, Earle. He’s not like his daddy. He’s a sharp son of a gun and he wants to run that paper like it was the Baltimore Sun.” His voice hardened. “There’s ways to make him back off. If you get my drift.”

  And then on Saturday, Mr. Scroggins made two calls, the first one to Verna (which Violet overheard), telling her not to come in to work on Monday and to turn over her key. And the second one to Coretta Cole (which Myra May overheard), telling her that he wanted her to come back full time and manage the office. He said that he was putting Verna “on furlough” while they straightened out a few things.

  “I’m gettin’ the locks changed on the office door, too,” he added. “I’m gonna give you a new key, Coretta. I want you to be the first one there every mornin’ to unlock and let the other girls in, and the last one to leave every night. And if you can find out which one of ’em has been talkin’ outta turn to Charlie Dickens over at the Dispatch, I’d be glad if you’d tell me. That may have gone down all right with DeYancy, but I won’t tolerate it. You got that?”

  Coretta hadn’t bothered to ask the whys and wherefores. She wasn’t the kind who did. The less she knew, the better she liked it—which is how Myra May saw it, anyway.

  And by that time, Myra May and Violet had put two and two together and had come to the logical conclusion: there was fifteen thousand dollars missing from the county treasury and their friend Verna Tidwell was under suspicion.

  “Do you think Verna will actually be . . .” Violet hesitated, looked over her shoulder as if to make sure that nobody else could hear her, and mouthed the word arrested.

  “It didn’t sound like Earle Scroggins was terribly anxious to get the sheriff in on this.” Frowning, Myra May forked a bit of sausage, ran it through the soft yolk of her fried egg, and dredged it in grits. “I wonder why. You’d think he’d go straight to the law with his suspicions and let the sheriff investigate, wouldn’t you?”

  “Well, yes.” Violet frowned. “And how can he be so sure that Verna is involved? Does he have some kind of evidence against her?”

  “He doesn’t have any kind of evidence,” Myra May replied indignantly. “For one thing, Mr. Tombull couldn’t have the report from the auditor’s office yet. It was just mailed on Friday.” She put down her fork. “Anyway, you know there can’t be evidence against Verna, Violet. She’s as honest as the day is long. She’d never take anything that didn’t belong to her. Not one red cent.”

  “I agree.” Violet pushed her plate away. “But somebody took that money, if the state auditor is right and it’s truly missing. And surely he wouldn’t make a mistake of that size.” Cupcake was fussing in her bassinet and she got up and went to pick up the baby.

  “Fifteen thousand dollars,” Myra May said in a hushed voice. “Almost more than I can imagine.”

  “Me, too.” Violet sat back down with Cupcake on her lap and picked up a spoon. The baby smiled and waved her fists, anticipating breakfast. “But as I say, Myra May, somebody took that money. And since the auditor figured out that it was missin
g, there must be some evidence of some sort.” She splashed a little cream onto the grits, stirred it in, and spooned up a bit for Cupcake, who smacked her lips and cooed, then leaned forward for more.

  “I suppose.” Myra May pulled her brows together. “So maybe there’s evidence. But it can’t point to Verna, because she didn’t have anything to do with it. And if Mr. Scroggins thinks she does, he’s crazy as a bedbug.”

  Violet looked up. “Unless,” she said quietly, “somebody made it point to Verna.”

  Myra May stared at her. “You don’t think—”

  “I’m afraid I do,” Violet said. “In which case, it might be a good idea to let Verna know what we know. It sounds like the deck might be stacked against her. And somebody’s dealing off the bottom.”

  Myra May considered this for a moment. “How about if I talk this over with Liz first,” she offered. “Liz has a good head on her shoulders, and she works in a law office. She might be able to—” She didn’t get to finish her sentence.

  “Miz Mosswell,” Euphoria called from the kitchen. “I got the grocery list ready. Somebody gonna go shoppin’ this mornin’, or do I gotta cook what’s on hand?”

  Myra May picked up her plate and silver and stood up. “I’ll go, Euphoria. What do we need?”

  Euphoria cackled. “Jes’ ’bout everything. List as long as my arm.”

  Myra May sighed. “Well, let me see how much cash we have in the register.”

  “Long as we can git chickens, eggs, and ham, we’ll be all right,” Euphoria replied. “Them green beans is comin’ on in the garden out there, and we’ll have okra and black-eyed peas right soon.”

  “Well, that’s good,” Myra May replied absently. She was already thinking about talking to Liz and wondering how much she could tell her without breaking the Rule. “I guess we can feed folks out of the garden.”

  At the table, holding the baby in her lap, Violet pressed her lips together. She wasn’t thinking of the Rule. She was thinking of that fifteen thousand dollars that was missing from the county treasury and imagining all the ways they could use that money, if they had it.

  SIX

  Bessie

  At Bessie Bloodworth’s suggestion, Miss Rogers had worked over the weekend to copy onto paper the mysterious symbols and letters that were cross-stitched on her grandmother’s pillow. She had done the work with painstaking care, making sure to get every little line and dot just right. In the process, she had gained a new respect for her grandmother’s cross-stitching skills, which were truly quite fine. In fact, some of the stitched symbols were so minuscule that Miss Rogers had to use a magnifying glass to make them out. Perhaps even more importantly, she had learned her grandmother’s initials. On one side of the pillow, in tiny letters, she had found the word Rose and a date, July 16, 1861, embroidered in the tiniest of stitches.

  “Eighteen sixty-one!” Miss Rogers exclaimed, as she reported this discovery to Bessie as the two of them were collecting the bedsheets for Monday’s laundry. (Each Magnolia Lady stripped her own bed and piled the sheets in the hallway.) “Eighteen sixty-one was just thirteen years before I was born. The first year of the War Between the States.” She pulled her brows together. “And to think that I owe this interesting bit of information to the claws of that wretched cat. Is it actually true that he’s going to a new home?”

  “I sincerely hope so.” Bessie picked up a pillowcase. “I telephoned Ophelia last night, after Lucky Lindy did himself in by unraveling Mrs. Sedalius’ knitting. It turns out that Lucy Murphy has been looking for a barn cat to keep the mice down, so Ophelia volunteered to take Lindy out to the Murphys’ place this afternoon. Lucy and Ophelia married cousins, you know.” She paused. “Ophelia also thought she might know where to find a kitten, too—to replace the cat. I hope you won’t object.”

  Miss Rogers sighed. “Cat fur is my bête noire. But a kitten is certainly preferable to that scruffy fellow who likes to leap off the draperies and onto our laps. Still, I have to be grateful that he unraveled the cover of my pillow. I might never have discovered that it concealed something important.”

  Bessie dumped Maxine’s sheets into the basket. “I’ve got to go shopping this morning. Would you like to come along? We could take your transcription to the Dispatch office and show it to Mr. Dickens. He might be able to tell us something about it.”

  Miss Rogers hesitated. “I hope you don’t think . . . That is, I’ve been reconsidering the plan we talked about and . . .” Her voice trailed off and she started again, tentatively. “While I’m acquainted with Mr. Dickens as a library patron, I’m not entirely comfortable around the man. He makes me feel . . .” She stopped, coloring. “You’re going to think I’m very silly.”

  “No, not at all,” Bessie said. She straightened up and looked at Miss Rogers. “I’ve been acquainted with Charlie Dickens for a good many years. He’s a very bright man, but he’s . . . well, he’s skeptical, and critical. And he lived in many different places before he came back here.” Charlie may have grown up in Darling, but his years of travel and his life in big cities had given him a different perspective on small-town life. Most Darlingians no longer saw him as a local boy.

  “Precisely,” Miss Rogers said in a grateful tone. “Thank you, Miss Bloodworth. Mr. Dickens can be extremely critical at times. And there is something quite ironic about that eyebrow of his. When he lifts it, it’s as if he’s secretly laughing at something you’ve said. I would be glad to have his opinion about the symbols on the pillow. But I would prefer not to hear him say that it’s just some sort of female foolishness.” She sighed. “Which I now suspect that it is.”

  “You do?” Bessie asked sympathetically. “Why?”

  “As I copied things down, I tried to figure out for myself what they might mean. I confess that I found myself at a total loss. I have enjoyed words and language all my life, and thought I might find some meaning in it—if it was a code, that is. But the more I looked at it, the more it looked like so much gibberish. I thought perhaps I might mail Mr. Dickens a copy, with a letter explaining where I found it. He could telephone me with his opinion, or write it down and mail it back.” She shook her head dispiritedly. “But I don’t want to go to a lot of trouble just to have him tell me that it’s all just nonsense and that I’m an old fool for taking it seriously.”

  Bessie understood Miss Rogers’ reluctance, but she hated to see her drop the project so quickly. And besides, now that she’d had time to think about it, she herself was intrigued by the symbols and numbers. Were they just so much gibberish? Or was there a hidden meaning, perhaps a clue to the story behind the pillow? As an historian of sorts, Bessie couldn’t help wanting to know more.

  She picked up the laundry basket. “Tell you what, Miss Rogers. I have to go to Hancock’s for groceries after Roseanne and I finish with these sheets. The Dispatch office is right next door. I could take your copy and leave it. If Mr. Dickens is interested, he can reply either by telephone or by mail.” She paused. “Would you like me to do that?”

  Miss Rogers looked doubtful. “You’re sure? You aren’t afraid the man will raise that ironical eyebrow at you?” She laughed, but only a little.

  Bessie smiled, thinking that Miss Rogers was beginning to seem like a real person, now that she had revealed a few chinks in her armor of prim self-assurance. “He might. But if he does, I’ll simply raise my eyebrow right back.” She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “His younger sister Edna Fay and I were best friends when we were girls. I know a secret about Mr. Dickens.”

  This was true, although the secret was only mildly embarrassing or perhaps even endearing, depending on your point of view. It definitely wasn’t scandalous and it had happened a very long while ago. It was a high school romance, documented in a couple of passionate love letters that a young Charlie Dickens, smitten, had written to Angelina Dupree, who was now married to Art
is Biggs, the manager of the Old Alabama Hotel. Angelina had returned the letters, and Bessie and Edna Fay had found them when they were snooping in Charlie’s room after he went off to his first year at Alabama Polytechnic. Faces burning, hearts pounding, the girls had read them, giggling hysterically the whole while, of course. To this day, Bessie remembered those letters, in which a passionate young man had poured out the dearest hopes and dreams of his heart, and very poetically, too. She occasionally thought about them when she saw Charlie or Angelina around town, and wondered whether they remembered them as well as she did.

  That was the thing about living in a small town, where people sometimes knew too much about one another, or knew secret things or things that had been hidden so long they were almost forgotten. The past was always intruding on the present, even when you least expected it. You never knew when some little something—the smell of a flower or the sound of a voice—was going to pull you back into what once was. Sometimes, it was hard to tell just where the past ended and the present began, and some people seemed mostly to dwell in the past. History was Bessie’s hobby, so she knew this very well.

  “Well, then.” Miss Rogers straightened her shoulders. “If you’re willing to brave the lion in his den for me, I’m sure I’d be grateful. Thank you, Miss Bloodworth.” And she actually put out her hand.

  Bessie took it and held it for a moment. Miss Rogers’ fingers were sticklike, almost all bone, and rather chilly.

  “You’re welcome,” she said, feeling moved by what felt like an offer of friendship. “And I really wish you’d call me Bessie. After all, we’ve been living together for several years, and both of us are Dahlias. Shouldn’t we be on a first-name basis?”

  Miss Rogers withdrew her hand.