All the Single Ladies: A Novel

by Dorothea Benton Frank

  My heart skipped a beat, and quite literally, I gasped.

  “What did you find?” I said, knowing in my gypsy bones that whatever she had found had to do with Kathy Harper.

  In the next breath I remembered that Kathy had owned a copy of Gone with the Wind.

  “This. Here.” She handed me an envelope. “Open it.”

  Inside was the birth certificate of a female child who belonged to Kathy Gordon Harper and David Inmon Harper and a death certificate for that same child, dated two years later. The cause was listed as an accidental drowning. There were newspaper clippings in the envelope that said there had been an investigation into the child’s death, that the father was a suspect. Then another article stated the father had been cleared. The child’s death was ruled an accident and the case was closed. But there was a glaring piece of information in the newspaper articles that caught my attention and held it. David Harper was the owner of Harper Grocery Stores. I may not have been so well traveled but even I knew of Harper Grocery Stores. There were at least two hundred of them all over the midwest and the West Coast. Their ads were everywhere and their charitable support to end children’s hunger all around the world was very well known. The death of the Harpers’ child must have been completely devastating to them, especially if there was a cloud of suspicion around it. I got the chills and shivered all over.

  “Oh, dear. Are you all right?” Marilyn asked.

  “I’m fine. I’m relieved. I’m so relieved you can’t imagine. Do you mind if I take these?” I said.

  “No, of course not. Did you know about this child? I’m so sorry if I’ve upset you.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m fine. I knew the child’s mother. This may have just given us the last piece of information we needed to solve a very big puzzle.”

  “Well, good! I’m glad I could help!”

  I got up to leave.

  “Marilyn? Thank you. Thank you for saving this for me. If you find anything else in the library books?”

  “I’ll call you right away,” she said. “Lisa? By the way?”

  I opened the front door to leave then stopped, turning back to her.

  “Yes, ma’am?”

  “How well do you know Mr. Morrison?”

  “Well enough,” I said. “Is that handsome devil flirting with you?”

  “No, I don’t think I would call it flirting exactly,” she said, and looked a little sheepish. “But if you’re calling him a devil, that must mean he has a reputation.”

  “Let’s just say he likes the ladies,” I said.

  “Gotcha!”

  I hurried back to the office, grabbed my phone from my purse, and called Paul.

  “You gotta be kidding me,” he said when I told him.

  “Nope! Do you want to come over for burgers and watch Carrie’s and Suzanne’s faces hit the floor when I tell them the news?”

  “Only if you’ll let me do the grilling. I wouldn’t want to miss this.”

  “You are about the sweetest man I’ve ever known,” I said.

  “What about the sexiest?”

  “Okay, yes, that too! You’re so silly.”

  I stuck my nose in Harry’s office. He had been amazed and horrified to hear the story of Wendy Murray and Kathy’s estate. He was at his desk.

  “Sherlock Holmes reporting in. You got a minute?”

  “Sure! What’s up?”

  I told him the story and showed him the documents.

  “Holy crap. That’s terrible about the baby, but it’s not unusual for the death of a child to cause a divorce. And you know what? I would shake out the rest of Kathy’s books and see what else you can find. And I’d put something in the newsletter asking residents to give us anything they come across.”

  “Of course, and I will, but, Harry, this means we can find him! He can identify the stuff Wendy’s holding and put an end to that madness! All we have to do is get his phone number or his e-­mail from his website. We’ve found him!” I blushed from head to toe and knew my body temperature had to be over a hundred degrees.

  “Want me to look him up?” Harry offered.

  “Yes! Please!”

  With a few clicks of his mouse, he was there.

  “Come see. Is this your man?”

  I went around his side of the desk, and there was the face of a man named David Inmon Harper in one of those corporate head shots on the company’s website. There was an e-­mail address to reach him directly, a phone number for the business, and a street address of the headquarters. Quickly, I copied down the information. I was so happy I was just a blither.

  “Oh my God, Harry. This is major. Thank you, I mean, this is incredible.”

  He sat back in his chair and said, “Gosh, I just love watching grown women get so worked up! Now, get out of here. I’ve got a mountain of work to do.”

  “Oh, fine,” I said, and turned to go.

  “Wait a minute,” he said. “What do you think this means for Suzanne?”

  “Justice. And it might mean a lot of money, Harry. A lot.”

  “And here I was harboring the wicked thought that she might be after mine. Shame on me.”

  “Sure. Listen, I’m making burgers on the grill tonight and I’m saving this news until I get home and they’re all there. You want to join us?”

  “Paul coming?”

  “Yep,” I said.

  “Oh, what the hell. I can wash my hair anytime.”

  “You know what, Harry?”

  “What?”

  “Sometimes you’re actually funny, in a ‘blond joke’ kind of way.”

  Late that afternoon, I walked my dog, set the table, and got the burgers ready to go on the grill. I decided to call my parents to discuss Marianne and her husband.

  “Mom?”

  “Well, there you are! Your father and I decided it was best to let you cool off for a few days.”

  “I don’t know. I think I’m still in shock. I can’t believe that she really married that stupid idiot. Can you? What could she possibly see in him?”

  “Please, I’ve been weeping since Saturday.”

  “Me too. And Miss Trudie died. We had to bury her this week. It’s just been a terrible week all around.”

  “Oh, come on. Didn’t you tell me she was ninety-­nine years old?”

  “Yes, Mom. But that doesn’t mean I won’t miss her.”

  “Okay. I understand that. But you always have had such a problem with loss. You know that, don’t you?”

  If I’d been in the room with her then, I might have strangled her dead two times. But she wasn’t going to change and I wasn’t going to teach her anything. So I let her words slide in through my right ear, out of my left, and visualized them disappearing into dust motes and then nothingness.

  “Yes. But now I’m afraid I’ve lost Marianne again.”

  “No, you haven’t. She’s still your daughter and I wouldn’t bet five cents on the longevity of that marriage. Your father says it might not even be valid. An Elvis marriage? Come on. I mean, we never saw a marriage license, did we?”

  “I had not thought of that, Mom. Did Dad look this up on Google?”

  “Google? Siri? Safari? TripAdvisor? How should I know where he gets his information? But he does have serious doubts. What does your handsome boyfriend think?”

  Handsome boyfriend. Oh, boy.

  “Well, he’s not as blunt as Dad, but he thinks her anger is temporary, that she’ll eventually calm down. Even my friend Carrie says to wait and see. It’s so ridiculous that it’s hard to take it all seriously.”

  “You’re right. It seems like the only kind of decision Marianne knows how to make is a wrong one.”

  “I agree. But here’s the killer: Mark! How could he do that to me?”

  “Because he’s a narcissistic son of a v
ery bad word.”

  “He sure is. Should I go out there? Should I call him?”

  “No, and say what? ‘Why did you hurt me?’ Are you serious? Leave them alone to stew in their own juices for a while. They’ll come around. So tell me. Are you going to be moving again?”

  “Not right away. Suzanne wants me to stay. And Carrie got married, did you know that?”

  “I don’t know Carrie, and so no, I didn’t know.”

  “Well, she’s the other friend . . . oh, never mind. Anyway, her new husband has moved in with us now.”

  “What’s this? Are you living in a hippie commune? Let me get your father. Alan! Alan!”

  “Oh, Mom. No. Please! It’s not like that.”

  Sometimes she could be so exasperating.

  We hung up and I began pacing the floors, with Pickle on my heels, of course. Waiting for Suzanne, Carrie, and Mike to come home from work was like watching a pot of water, waiting for it to come to a boil.

  Carrie and Mike had moved all her things and much of his into Miss Trudie’s rooms, and it looked so cozy. Miss Trudie would have approved. In the few days Mike had been in residence, I’d decided it was pretty sweet having a man around the house. As long as he was there, I wouldn’t have to carry bags of groceries or dry cleaning up the steps. He wouldn’t let me. He was a perfect gentleman. But meanwhile, where were they?

  “Come home!” I called out to the thin air.

  I was still staying in my room and Carrie’s former bedroom was now designated as the guest room or the snoring room. In other words, now that Mike was here and on occasion Paul, if and when they started honking like rhinos in the wild in the middle of the night, they were redirected to the extra bedroom.

  Harry had not yet been awarded sleepover status but it was only a question of time. The longer Suzanne held out, the more creative he became in the ways he tried to lure her into the sack. Last night, he brought her gelato from BeardCats and fed it to her, telling her she was too thin. And the night before, he brought her some kind of French perfume and told her he had dreamed they were in Paris together, drinking wine and eating foie gras, and Edith Piaf was singing “La Vie en Rose” somewhere in the distance. Two mornings ago he appeared at seven thirty and made her banana pancakes while Jack Johnson sang the “Banana Pancakes” song in the background on his iPad. I had no idea Harry Black could be so adorable but I knew he also had to be at his wit’s end. Soon Suzanne was going to be on the receiving end of the I’m-­a-­man-­and-­I-­have-­needs-­you-­know speech. Poor Harry. I really felt for the guy. We all did.

  Finally! I heard a car and I snapped out of my fog. Oh, I know, I could’ve called Suzanne and Carrie at work, but I wanted to see the look on their faces when they heard the news.

  “You’re not going to believe my good news or my bad news,” I said as soon as they reached the front porch.

  “What?” Carrie said.

  “Give us the bad news first,” Suzanne said.

  “Kathy Harper had a baby who drowned.” I handed them the newspaper articles and the death certificate. “This was found in a copy of Gone with the Wind that belonged to Kathy. A resident at Palmetto House found it.”

  “Merciful God!” Suzanne said. “How terrible!”

  “Oh Lord. I wonder if her heartbreak caused her cancer?” Carrie said. “The poor woman!”

  Suzanne and I stared at her.

  “What? They say there’s a mind-­body connection between illness and happiness, don’t they?” Carrie said.

  “Actually, you’re right. There is a lot of thought on that. Anyway, here’s the good news. I found David Inmon Harper. He’s the David Harper of Harper Grocery Stores.”

  “Get out of town!” Carrie said.

  “Where is he?” Suzanne said.

  I held up the piece of paper with his contact information on it.

  “Let’s get this guy on the phone,” Suzanne said. “Wait! Is your laptop on?”

  “That thing? I should throw it off the bridge. We can e-­mail from my phone or your phone right now.”

  “Wait. It’s six here, so it’s still four in Minneapolis,” Suzanne said. “No, I’m going to take a shot with a phone call. He might still be in his office.”

  Carrie said, “Who knows? But yes, call him. I hate putting things in writing, especially when I don’t know what impact they might have. I mean, maybe he’s got a psycho jealous colleague who he’s having an affair with, who’d threaten murder and suicide if she thought she was losing him, and a crazy second or third wife at home who’d go postal and set the house on fire if she found an e-­mail about his ex-­wife on his computer.”

  Suzanne and I stopped and looked at her.

  “You really ought to write thrillers,” Suzanne said.

  “How do you even think of these things?” I said, and laughed.

  “I read the newspapers,” Carrie said. “Y’all don’t have a single solitary clue about what goes on in the world. I do.”

  “Right,” Suzanne said. “Y’all? What am I going to say to him?”

  “Easy,” I said. “When the secretary says, ‘Who’s calling?’ you say, ‘This is Suzanne Williams from Charleston, South Carolina.’ Say, ‘I was Kathy Gordon’s best friend.’ Don’t use his name because then the little busybody will tell everybody in the office before he even has a chance to decide how to handle this.”

  “Good call, Lisa,” Carrie said. “And if she says, ‘He’s in a meeting,’ just say, ‘Please ask him to return my call’ and give her your number. That’s all. Keep it real simple.”

  “Right. Keep it simple.” Suzanne took a deep breath. “Okay, I’m doing this.”

  She pressed the numbers into her keypad and put the phone to her ear. Sure enough, a living and breathing secretary answered. We nearly fainted.

  “Good afternoon. This is David Harper’s office. How may I assist you?”

  The connection was so clear that Carrie and I could hear every word without even putting Suzanne’s phone on speaker.

  “I’d like to speak to Mr. Harper, please?”

  “May I say who is calling?”

  “Of course. This is Suzanne Williams calling from South Carolina. Please tell him that I was Kathy Gordon’s best friend.”

  “Hold please and let me see if he can be reached.”

  “Sure,” Suzanne said.

  The hold line was playing a droning, looping commentary on how important fiber was to our diets while Suzanne was nearly hyperventilating from nerves.

  “Are you okay? Do you want me to talk to him?” I asked.

  “No! No! I want to do this,” she said.

  Minutes passed. Just when it seemed that Suzanne had been on hold forever, the secretary picked up again.

  “Mr. Harper will take your call now. Mr. Harper? You’re on with Suzanne Williams.”

  “Mr. Harper?” Suzanne said.

  “Yes? How can I help you, Ms. Williams?”

  “Well, I’m afraid I’m calling with some very sad news. Kathryn Gordon Harper passed away a few months ago.”

  “Oh. I’m very sorry to hear it. When my secretary said that you said you were her friend instead of you are her friend, I knew. Kathy was a very special and very lovely woman.”

  “Yes. Yes, she was. I was her friend and she also worked for me.”

  “I see. Well, Kathy and I divorced a number of years ago.”

  “Yes, I know. I’m the executor of her estate and I’ve seen the decree. I apologize for the fact that it took me so long to contact you. We had a hard time piecing Kathy’s past together.”

  He was quiet then and we all knew he was wondering if Suzanne knew about the baby.

  “What do you mean? She was your friend and she never told you she had been married?”

  “No, she didn’t. Mr. Harper?”

 
“Call me David, please. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

  “Then call me Suzanne. I knew Kathy when I was a little girl. She used to babysit for me. Then she left Charleston, moved to Minnesota, I moved to Chicago, and we never heard a word from her. When she came home she refused to discuss her years there with anyone. By then her parents were deceased and she had no siblings, but of course you know that.”

  “Yes. Suzanne, may I ask what the cause of death was?”

  “Cancer.”

  “Cancer. Oh, the poor girl. My God. Well, cancer is tragic enough, but I’m glad it wasn’t an accident or foul play. I’d have a harder time accepting that. She had enough tragedy in her short life. Well, how terrible. She was way too young to die. I’m so, so sorry to hear this. Tell me, what can I do?”

  “Well, I have her ashes and I thought you might want them, or if you don’t, maybe you’d have a better idea of how to dispose of them. She told me to just spread them around my herb garden, but that didn’t seem dignified enough for her.”

  “I know exactly what to do with them, and yes, I would like to have them.”

  “I think it’s legal to ship them through the post office. I can check to see what the requirements are, if you’d like me to do that?”

  “Let me just look at something on my calendar.” There was a pause. And then he said, “I thought so. Okay, I have to be in Atlanta to look at a property on Monday. I haven’t been to Charleston in years. So, if it’s convenient for you, I can fly in Monday night?”

  “That would be great,” Suzanne said.

  “And maybe I can buy you dinner in return for all the trouble you’ve been through?”

  “That sounds very nice. I actually have some questions I’d like to ask you to put some things to rest.”

  “Sure. I’m happy to share anything I know that might help. I’ll call you Monday?”

  “Yes. Thank you, David. Here’s my number.”

  Suzanne gave him her number and pressed end call.

  We looked at each other and started jumping like the Masai, hugging and screaming.

  “Woot! Woot! We’re gonna kick Wendy’s ass! Oh yeah! And get a pound of flesh for Kathy!”