Rosemary for Remembrance

by Christine Arness

  As Terrell watched, Julia took Nathan’s arm and spoke in an urgent undertone. Nathan nodded, threaded his way over to Austin, and tapped him on the shoulder. For a moment it appeared to Terrell that the slim figure in the black jacket would refuse Nathan’s request, but apparently realizing the three were the focus of attention, Austin backed away with a curt bow of surrender.

  Rosemary moved with languid grace into Nathan’s arms and the couple were swallowed up by the other dancers. Terrell regretted her own appearance would never drive men to suicide—or drink for that matter. Austin had rejoined his original partner and was dipping into the punch bowl, draining cup after cup of the spiked concoction, while a placid-featured Celeste kept pace. They’d both be as tight as prohibition smashers before the evening was over.

  The smoke from many cigarettes formed a haze in one corner of the room and the crowd on the dance floor thinned. Out in the parking lot, many of the men were probably now smoking and sipping from personal flasks stronger drinks than the punch. Thinking about male arrogance and listening to the incessant babble of voices made Terrell’s head ache. Without a word to her partner, she disengaged herself and stalked off the floor.

  “Calm down, my little pepper pot.” Jay caught her arm just above the elbow. “Folks will think I made an indecent proposition. How about some punch to cool you off?”

  “If you keep looking at Rosemary like a starving man eyeing a steak, I’ll cool you off with some punch.”

  Terrell freed herself and whirled, almost colliding with Connie Wheeler near the buffet table. Connie was wearing a dress that Terrell recognized from last year, a childish white poplin with a boat neck and puffy sleeves. The girl’s eyes, like the fabric of her dress, were dull and dispirited.

  “Excuse me, please.” Connie pushed past them and Terrell turned to stare after her, wondering about the vivid scratch on her cheek and was that a piece of tree bark caught in her waistband?

  Jay put his arm around his partner and steered her over to the punch bowl where several other couples had gathered. Terrell continued to scold. “You don’t have to keep staring at her—she hasn’t got eight legs.”

  Jay grinned. “With those legs, two are enough.”

  Austin Kyle must have overheard the remark. His mouth formed a grim line before he said, “Come on, Celeste. Let’s dance.”

  Terrell watched the other couple move back onto the floor and, turning, found herself next to Malinda Evans who was wiping at a stain on her dress and glaring at her husband.

  “You’ve ruined this gown,” she complained in shrill accents, her beaded turban tipped askew, transforming her matronly dignity into a flapper’s rakishness.

  “What happened, Malinda?” Jay inquired in his lazy drawl, ladling crimson liquid into a faceted crystal cup and handing it to Terrell.

  “He was ogling you know who when I was pouring punch and bumped into me,” she snapped. “A grand entrance for a little tramp, wasn’t it?”

  A deliciously shocked murmur of protest ran around the group but no one made any attempt at rebuttal and all eyes turned to the section of the room where Rosemary was shimmying her shoulders and hips to the pounding beat.

  “Amazing how her gown seems immune to the effects of gravity,” Jay remarked with the sobriety of a judge passing sentence.

  The men guffawed and even Terrell had to smile at his nonsense, but Malinda snorted in disgust. “I think cold water might be the answer.” She abandoned the crumpled, stained napkin on the table. “Come with me, Terrell.”

  A glance in Jay’s direction revealed him to be deep in conversation, and miffed at his neglect, Terrell followed Malinda. Fortunately, they found the powder room deserted and Malinda stood motionless as Terrell unzipped the melon-tinted gown and slid the fragile material past Malinda’s hips.

  Stepping out of the dress, Malinda examined the stain at the thigh. “Ruined! I spent almost seven dollars on a dress that didn’t last two hours.”

  “Try the cold water.” Terrell fumbled in her lace evening bag for a cigarette case and matches.

  She blew a cloud as Malinda, clad only in a thin slip, ran water over the disfiguring mark. The elderly powder room attendant moved over to offer assistance in the salvage operation.

  Terrell inhaled soothing smoke and coughed, leaning her aching head against the cool tiles of the wall. Rosemary’s entrance had taken away her pleasure in the décolletage and revealing scallops of lace of her gown; it was ridiculous that one woman could make her feel as though she should be out on a mountain herding goats.

  Except for the sound of running water and Malinda’s muttered curses, the room was quiet. The transom over the door was open, but the hubbub of the dance was too far away to penetrate.

  Dating Jay was as exciting as watching corn ripen. What did she want out of life? To marry and settle down seemed too stifling and narrow, but her father kept hinting that Jay was a fine young man and Mother was happily absorbed in hemming handkerchiefs and looking at silver patterns for Terrell’s hope chest.

  Lost in her musings, at first she failed to recognize the low voices catching at the fringes of her attention. The voices grew louder and more demanding; she risked a glance at Malinda, who was still absorbed in saving her dress, her head bent, oblivious to anything except her struggle with the stain.

  Moving over, Terrell cracked the door and peered out into the narrow passageway. Rosemary and Julia stood outside, their backs against the walls and their figures silhouetted against the light from the main room beyond.

  Julia’s voice was low-pitched, harsh. “You don’t care for anything but the money he’ll inherit.”

  “I care enough not to stand by and watch you destroy him.” By contrast, Rosemary almost purred, placing her word blows with the expertise of a champion boxer feeling out an opponent.

  Julia spat out a curse and Terrell shrank back. The hatred radiating from the taller woman seemed too powerful to be contained in the hallway.

  “You’re a gold digger, clawing up from the dirt. You try to grab something finer, but you’ll both go down together.”

  Rosemary smiled. “Austin and I will be married, and there’s nothing you or your father can do to stop us.”

  Julia’s gaze had dropped to the necklace. “Those pearls! Where did you get them?”

  She took a step forward, her mouth a thin smear of red. Rosemary could not retreat; her back was literally against the wall, but one hand reached up to touch the necklace and Terrell held her breath at the provocative movement.

  A tinkling, scornful laugh. “These beads? I intend to own more precious jewels than this trinket before I’m through with the Kyles.”

  “Those were my mother’s! Austin had no right to give them to a tramp like you!” Julia reached out and yanked at the pearls, wrenching them clear of the satiny skin of Rosemary’s throat. The thin string proved unequal to the pressure and snapped, the round globes cascading to the floor and bouncing as if in ecstasy at their freedom.

  Rosemary made no move to defend herself. Raising her chin, she stared into Julia’s bitter, hate-filled eyes.

  “Poor Julia. Jealous of Austin’s manhood. You and your father intend to force him into a mold of books and law, but it won’t work. You have to let him go.” Rosemary turned her head and gazed at the kaleidoscope of couples appearing and disappearing at the mouth of the hallway tunnel. Her voice was amused, thoughtful. “You’ll dance at our wedding, Sister Julia.”

  A tortured scream from Julia. “Slut! You’ll never take Austin!” Julia’s hand lifted but Rosemary’s tanned fingers shot out to intercept the intended blow.

  “Don’t interfere, Julia. I’m more than a match for your petty tyrannies. Austin loves me and I love him—you’ve heard of the power of the love of a good woman.” A tantalizing laugh.

  With a sob, Julia wrenched free. The women stared at each other until Julia broke and pressed the heels of her hands against her forehead. A smile playing about her mouth, Rosemary pivoted
and walked back to the dance floor, her hips udulating in the sinuous rhythm of a woman who uses her sexuality as a weapon.

  Julia looked after her rival for several seconds, her hands plucking the air as if thrumming invisible harp strings. The power of Rosemary’s allure hammered home the knowledge to the onlooker that Julia was fighting a losing battle for Austin—family pride couldn’t compete with the siren’s call.

  Bowing her head, Julia seemed to notice for the first time the pearls scattered around her feet. She fell to her knees, her hands scrabbling for the elusive gems and her breath coming in short, painful gasps.

  Terrell stood frozen like an icicle hanging from the eave of a house. The spectacle of Julia Kyle shedding years of acquired poise and reverting to a temper-tossed child shook the watcher to the core and she allowed the door to swing shut with a whisper of air. Malinda was holding up the dress while the attendant tried to dry it with a hand towel.

  Blinking, Terrell tried to orient herself. In justice, the universe should have paused in awe to witness such a titanic struggle of wills. The intensity of the emotions displayed by the two women made Terrell’s own life seem dry and passionless by contrast. Jay was nice, but she couldn’t imagine herself fighting for him or ripping a valuable necklace from another woman’s throat.

  She opened the door. The hallway was deserted, but the very air seemed to bear traces of the recent combat.

  “I have to wait until this dries,” Malinda fretted. “If you’re so anxious to return to Jay that you have to keep peeking out the door, go ahead.”

  After a bemused look at the tranquil surroundings of the powder room, Terrell slipped away. She found Jay still sipping punch and gesturing with his free hand as he described the ailments of the pastor’s old Model T.

  “Let’s dance, Jay.”

  He good-naturedly allowed her to tug him back to the floor, pausing only long enough to place his cup on the table and straighten his tie.

  “You were gone long enough to sew a new dress for that harpy,” he remarked.

  “Shut up and hold me close,” she retorted, the chill in her heart creeping through her bones.

  They stayed on the dance floor until Jay’s shirt was soaked with sweat and Terrell’s feet ached inside her pumps. Across the room, Rosemary and chubby Oliver Payton were paired together. Oliver looked dazzled, his eyes gazing adoringly at the goddess in his arms.

  Julia and Nathan whirled by, Nathan fresh from a trip outside and a nip from the silver flask sticking out of his hip pocket. Terrell caught a glimpse of Julia’s face and found herself shivering as if a winter blast had blown through the room. Julia’s eyes were empty once more, drained of emotion, like the blank windows of an abandoned house at dusk…

  Chapter 21

  Terrell gave her empty cup a final spin and the hippo ballerinas whirled in a mad dance. “I think if Julia had had a gun in her hand, she’d have pulled the trigger without blinking.” Her voice was bleak.

  “Hatred is an ugly emotion.” Abigail drew jagged lightning bolts across her notepad. “But then, Rosemary seems to have been a woman surrounded by turbulent emotions.”

  “She lived in the eye of a hurricane,” the older woman agreed. “And I—or anyone else—would have traded places with her in a minute.”

  Abigail wasn’t so sure. She wondered what it had been like to live inside the magic circle: envied and desired and even hated for what you were. Perhaps Rosemary had felt like an exotic caged animal—admired, pointed at, and expected to entertain the watchers whose relentless eyes studied her every movement.

  During Terrell’s recital, Ross had been silent, and now she turned to him. “No questions from the hotshot prosecutor? I’ve been waiting for your brilliant cross-examination.”

  He smothered a yawn with his hand and tilted his chair on its back legs. “What time did Rosemary leave?”

  Terrell spun the cup again as if taking her turn in a game of Russian roulette. “I wasn’t wearing a watch, of course, but I know that we danced at least half a dozen more dances plus a couple of breaks for the band. My guess would be ten, ten-thirty. And she wasn’t alone—I saw her slip out a side door with Oliver Payton.”

  “Did anyone else leave at the same time?”

  “That’s mighty hard to say.” Terrell tweaked the stuffed bear’s nose. “Most of the young people were involved in the constant parade out to the parking lot—moonlight strolls, some serious drinking away from the adults, a petting party in a private car.”

  “In other words, a typical dance. Your witness, Counselor.” He nodded to Abigail and brought the chair down with a bang.

  Abigail sensed a reserve forming over Terrell’s answers, and asked the next question with the awareness that a hard freeze might be imminent. “Do you remember when Julia and Austin left?”

  Terrell rose and busied herself gathering up the coffee mugs. “Can’t answer that one, I’m afraid. Jay and I stayed on the floor till the band surrendered and the trumpeter lost his lip. Swing dancing and doing the Suzie Q take a lot of concentration.”

  Her voice was suddenly too matter-of-fact and the blue eyes shifted away from her guests; the flow of confidences had been shut off as if someone had turned a tap. The woman’s formerly hard facade now revealed fine cracks—grayish smudges had appeared under her eyes and her hands knotted the hem of her blouse with restless fingers.

  Picking up an enormous feather duster, Terrell brushed it over the items on her desk. “Well, kiddies, thanks for the visit, but I’m expecting some important phone calls.”

  Abigail rose as Ross walked over and intercepted the feather duster to plant a kiss on the back of a veined hand. “Thank you, Terrell. Wish I could’ve seen you doing the Lindy Hop—I’ll bet you can still jitterbug with the best of them.”

  “When I think you’ve matured enough not to snicker, I’ll teach you dirty dancing.” She gave him a pert, coquettish smile and Abigail saw a flash of the vixen who’d so entranced Jay West.

  She risked a final question. “Whatever happened to Jay?”

  The feather duster jerked and knocked against the bear, who tilted back and toppled to the floor in a casual arc, as if he were a stuntman performing a routine fall.

  Terrell stared down at the sprawled animal, the feather duster clutched to her breast. “Jay joined the Air Force as a mechanic—died over in England when a bomb hit his plane hangar.”

  She shrugged. “Can’t complain—he died happy, up to his elbows in engine grease.” She bent to scoop the bear up in her arms.

  Ross was holding the door for Abigail. “Expecting some important business calls, Aunt Terrell?”

  The elderly woman stood beside her carousel horse, her eyes sparkling with unshed tears but holding herself with an air of pride, as if determined not to acknowledge the chink in the brittle front she’d maintained throughout their visit. “Yes, Ross, I said I was.”

  “Then you’d better plug the phone back in.”

  The bear sailed past his head and smacked into the doorpost, sliding to the floor where it stared up at them with vacant brown eyes.

  “I knew Julia and Austin were lying about not knowing Rosemary.” Abigail thanked the waiter as he refilled her glass.

  “Julia’s doing her best to push Austin into that supreme court vacancy. If Rosemary’s death is raked up, it might taint his candidacy with enough scandal to take him out of the running.” Ross drummed his fingers on the table, as restless now as he’d been subdued earlier.

  Abigail wondered if this journey into the past bored him as much as he pretended. Even Terrell’s graphic description of the violent passions of that night had elicited no more than a yawn.

  The Creole Scamp boasted the best Creole cooking in a hundred-mile radius, and in his dark suit and narrow red tie, Ross blended into the dusky background. Abigail had accepted his dinner invitation with the intention of clearing the air between them, but her companion seemed to view her acquiescence as a form of surrender and continually sough
t to bring the conversation down to a personal level.

  Now he was eyeing the smooth chignon at the nape of her neck. “I can’t decide which hairstyle I prefer—sophisticated lady or runaway forest fire.”

  “Fires are dangerous. People get burned.” She looked around, pretended to study the other patrons of the restaurant and fought the strange sensation that the universe had been reduced to the two of them.

  “I’d rather risk a blister than freeze to death.” He seemed amused by her crisp tone. “Don’t I deserve some thanks for arranging the interview with Terrell? She not only told you who escorted Rosemary away from the dance but was able to explain how the pearl got caught in the girl’s dress.”

  The narrow room was lit by wall sconces that cast muted pools of light over the individual tables, white islands surrounded by darkness. Abigail had the uneasy impression that a strong undertow existed in these murky waters; she felt herself falling victim to the powerful surge of an unseen current as something primitive and timeless sucked her under, into the whirlpool.

  She made an effort to steer the conversation to firm ground. “If Rosemary left with Oliver, why wasn’t he arrested in connection with her death? And why did the local rag, whose typical coverage of a fender bender lasted a week, all but ignore the tragedy?” Her crab bisque was cooling and she moved the spoon to create an eddy in the creamy broth. “But to me a question that must be answered is why Rosemary took Flora’s dress.”

  “Sisters even swipe each other’s boyfriends. I dated Olivia’s older sister first—” He coughed. “I mean, a dress couldn’t have been a major calamity.”

  “But Flora made the gown for a special occasion—” She broke off the argument, aware a man could never understand the sanctity of the dress and how Rosemary had violated Flora’s trust.

  The mention of Olivia seemed to have taken away Ross’s appetite; the stuffed lobster with garlic and cayenne pepper sat untouched on his plate. “Don’t romanticize this, Red. Most crimes stem from the basic human passions and this Spider sounds like a psychopath. Ruling out a simple hit-and-run accident, I lean toward the theory that he killed her.”