“And I’ll get a DBA and a new sales tax number and draw up our partnership papers,” I said. "We need to make sure that both our interests are protected.” I looked
at Ruby. "Maybe you should get Charlie Lipman to review the partnership stuff for you. You know, make sure I’m not trying to pull a fast one.”
She rolled her eyes. "For pity’s sake, China. If I can’t trust you to look out for my business interests, who can I trust?”
We talked for a little longer, then I said good-bye and drove to the shop to check on Laurel, pick up the cash bag, and see what kind of ordering I’d have to do for the coming week. For someone who valued her personal independence above all other worldy attributes, it had been a momentous few hours. I had acquired a spouse, a business partner, and a new business, all in one short, lifechanging afternoon.
It would take some getting used to.
Chapter Eleven
In Texas, where it is a sign of machismo to eat any hot pepper with no visible signs of regret, there is a superspicy kind that nobody eats. If the jalapefio is considered hot, this, the chili petin, is HOT! It’s a wilding, seldom seen in home gardens. Just one will flavor a pot of stew. You cannot abide having one in your mouth. Reference books sometimes call it a bird pepper: birds, especially mockingbirds, seem to favor them without burning their bills. This tiny, ovoid bundle of heat is also called chiltecpin, and a longer, pointed variety is called chilipiquin.
Russell Webber "Chilipetin: The Hottest”
The Hah Companion, Aug.-Sept. 1989I spent a half-hour with Laurel, talking business, then drove home. I had almost gotten used to McQuaid not being there, but the house seemed hugely empty without Brian and—I had to admit it—Leatha. I went upstMrs. to check on Einstein and found him frisky, having basked warmly in the sunlight on Brian’s drape all afternoon. I checked on Ivan and the various reptilian oddities in the cages under the window, then went downstMrs. to feed Howard Cosell, who roused himself with an effort from his favorite napping spot under my old Home Comfort kitchen stove.
“It’s just you and me, babe," I said, adding a little wet dog food to the diy, along with a generous sprinkling of garlic powder. I squatted down beside him as he wolfed down his dinner. “Hey, did you hear the big news?” I asked him. "McQuaid and I are getting married.”
Howard Cosell did not answer, being otherwise engaged. In the silence that followed my announcement, I was suddenly struck by a new thought. Would I still call him McQuaid after we were married? The name had come easily when we met—he was a detective with the Houston PD, I was a criminal attorney—and it had seemed right for our determinedly casual relationship. But marriage was different, and I might feel differently about calling my husband by his last name. And what about my own? Would I be China Bayles? China McQuaid? Some combination of the two?
These questions about names might seem simple, almost trivial, but they aren’t. I have had a law degree under my name, and a career, and a thriving business. What happens to me—my identity, my essential self, as Ruby would say—if I change it?
That wasn't a question I could dismiss lightly, and it brought up an even bigger one. I sat down on the floor beside Howard Cosell to think about it. I loved McQuaid, and part of me (the domesticated part that loves herbs and gardens and enjoys nest building) wanted to be married and live happily ever after, or to at least cohabit contentedly. But a different part of me—the logical part, that got her law degree and spent fifteen years in hand-to-hand combat in the legal system —wondered whether marriage and contentment (let alone happiness) were compatible concepts. Marriage was a big deal. What if I couldn’t han- die it? What if I began feeling trapped? What if I just needed to be alone? In fact, now that I considered all the ramifications, I wondered whether I could actually bring myself to —
Slurp.
Howard Cosell had finished his meal and, in an uncharacteristic burst of doggy affection, was licking my ear with a rough, garlicky tongue. I gave him a hug and stood up. I hadn’t come to any definitive conclusion because this wasn’t the kind of thing that could be definitively concluded.
Howard Cosell looked up at me and gave his tail two mournful wags. I looked down at him and said, "Thank you, Howard Cosell. Shall we get back to business?”
I let Howard out to do his in the backyard, and I went to the phone. Roxanne Cody answered cheerfully enough, I thought, for someone whose husband had died the day before. But theirs had obviously not been a happy marriage, and who am I to judge? When I gave my name and suggested that we get together that evening, however, she replied that her out-of-town in-laws were there and that they had family business to discuss. What did I want to see her about, and would tomorrow do as well?
I answered without hesitation, having already chosen my strategy. "Before he died, your husband said something to a friend that raises some questions about his death. And yes, tomorrow will be fine. Can we tiy for early in the morning?”
"Oh.” There was a silence. Then, sharply, "What kind of questions?”
"I’ll be glad to go over that with you in detail,” I said in a lawyer-ish tone. “Is eight o’clock too early?”
“I’m in the gym at that hour.”
"The Health Spa? I’d be glad to meet you there. How about eight-thirty?”
"I won’t have a lot of time.” She was getting more waty by the minute. "I have to be at the office at nine-thirty. Who did you say you are?”
"China Bayles,” I said. "Shall we say eight forty-five, then?” We did, and I hung up. Michelle’s Health and Fitness Spa is on Silver Creek Road, only a couple of miles away. I know the place well, because from time to time I have forced myself to work out on the machines. In fact, it might not be a bad idea for me to sign up for an exercise class while I was out there — I could stand to lose a few pounds. I straightened up and looked at my dumpy image in the mirror on the back of the hallway door, trying to imagine myself in something a little dressier than jeans and a T-shirt. Something like a wedding dress. I turned from the front view to the side and sighed. It had better be more than a few pounds, unless I wanted the Enterprise to report that the bride had been casually attired in a loose denim smock. The bride. The logical part of me cringed and I turned hastily back to the phone, to call Fannie Couch.
"Sure, come on over,” she said, when I reminded her that our morning conversation had been interrupted. "In fact, come for supper. I made potato salad and marinated some chicken. Clyde’s gonna put it on the grill so’s I can take a load off my tired feet. We won’t have a thing in the world to do but sit in the yard and criticize his cooking.”
It was an offer I couldn’t refuse. When I came up the walk, the mouthwatering odor of mesquite-grilled chicken made me remember that a couple of pieces of Ruby’s cake was all that stood between me and a long-ago lunch. Fannie and I settled ourselves with tall glasses of iced tea in low-slung canvas chMrs. under the weeping willow tree in the Couches’ pleasant backyard and prepared to critique Clyde’s performance at the grill. The blue blooms of a head-high clump of Indigo Spire salvia near the fence attracted a squadron of bumblebees and butterflies, and a hummingbird feeder hung in a nearby cedar elm. Ruby- throats and black-chinned hummers whirred noisily around it, the males bossing the females and juveniles and engaging in what looked like near-fatal aerial combat with their competitors. It was a hot evening, with the temperature still in the upper eighties and only a whisper of a breeze stirring the willow, but the heat was nothing new. The thermometer had registered ninety-plus almost eveiy day since mid-May, and the mercuiy would stay up there until mid-October. Texas summers are like the Dallas Cowboys—hard-charging well into the fourth quarter, with no sign of let-up.
"So.” Fannie adjusted the pillow under her head and lay back comfortably, hitching up her dress to cool her pale, pudgy knees. "What’s on your mind?”
"Opal Hogge,” I said. "You were going to tell me what she’s afraid of.”
She clinked the ice in her glass. "I hope I didn’t
exaggerate. You have to remember a lot of this is just gossip I’ve picked up here and there. No way can I put it in the program. If I can’t attribute my sources, I can’t put it on the air, and that’s all there is to it. Unless I want to end up on the business end of a lawsuit.”
"What didn’t you exaggerate?”
She waved away a curious yellow jacket. "Well, you might say that Opal Hogge is in way over her head and isn’t smart enough to know it. Or you could say she’s a sly puss with a hot temper who knows she can’t hack it and is doing her level best to pull the wool over eveiy- body’s eyes. The way she treated Carita Garza is downright nasty, but there’s more like it. She’s fired some, and others quit first, before she got to them. The turnover out there lately has been fierce. Now, that is one thing I do aim to (joint out as a problem,” she added. "If they can’t keep good workers, there’s a skunk in the woodpile somewhere.”
"Why did you make the remark about the police, Fannie? What reason might Hogge have to keep them away?” "Well, that's simple enough,” Fannie replied. "It sure as shootin’ wouldn’t look good to the board of directors if the chief administrator fired an employee for stealing and the police came and said the employee didn't do it after all. It sounds to me like Hogge wasn’t any too sure of her grounds and she didn't want some policeman telling her she was wrong.”
That was what it sounded like to me, too. "So you think a serious investigation might turn up a different thief?”
"I should hope so,” Fannie said. "That girl has worked miracles for that Garza family. I’d have to see some pretty strong proof before I felt right about accusing her. Didn’t you say the purse was in her locker? I hear myself wondering whether somebody put the credit card there and then put a bee in Opal Hogge’s bonnet. Somebody with a grudge against the girl, maybe.”
"I wondered that myself.” I paused. "How long has Opal Hogge been running the show out there?”
"A couple of years, at least.” Fannie picked up her iced tea and raised her voice. "Hey, Clyde, don’t forget to baste that chicken real good, you hear? Otherwise, it’ll fiy up just like shoe leather.” To me, she added, "Her nephew’s on the board—some professor or such over at the university. Edna says that’s how she got the job.”
"Her nephew wouldn’t be Colin Gaskill?” I asked warily.
“That’s right.” She gave me a curious glance over the rim of the glass. "How’d you know?”
"A lucky guess.” So much for going to the board—at least, to that particular board member. McQuaid would have to dig up somebody who might be more neutral on the subject of Hogge’s performance. "Where was she before she came here?”
"She directed a private nursing home in San Antonio,” Fannie said, "something to do with a church. That’s according to my friend Rosie Montgomery, who held a sister in the home. There was some kind of problem and Opal Hogge left. I can give you Rosie’s phone number if you want to dig a little deeper.”
“Sounds like the board didn’t take a very good look at Hogge before they hired her.”
Fannie peered at her watch. "That man doesn’t pay the least attention,” she said. “Clyde,” she said more loudly, "you better yank that com off the grill before it puckers up.” She sipped her tea and pushed her lips in and out, frowning. "Well, they had a mess on their hands—the Manor’s board, I mean. They sacked the previous director in a big hurry. That was Howard Dunaway, who got caught with both hands in the till. At the same time, they had a bunch of construction in the works, the new wing an’ all, an’ the State breathin’ down their neck about some problem or other that turned up on inspection. So I guess they took the first person that looked halfway decent on paper, without going into her background too deep. Especially since one of their own vouched for her.”
A male hummer buzzed me, his scarlet throat splendid in the sun. "Sounds like a dumb way to do business,” I said.
Fannie shrugged. "That board never did pay much attention to what was goin’ on. It let Howard Dunaway manage until he just about managed them into a hole in the ground. It probably won’t do any different by Opal Hogge.” She drew her white eyebrows together. "But if what you say is true about Hogge abusing Miss Velma— well, now, that’s something they’ll have to pay attention to, unless they want somebody to file criminal — ’’ She stopped. "Clyde Couch! Did you hear what I said about that corn? Get it out of that fire before it parches, or we’ll be gnawing grits off those cobs!”
We watched as Clyde hurriedly fished a foil-wrapped package out of the coals; then Fannie put her feet back up and said, sadly, "My heart bleeds for Miss Velma, it really does. She’s not old at all, you know, not much over sixty- five. She worked for old Tom Perry for over forty years, right up to the day he got killed, and for a few months after, winding up this and that. In fact, if the truth be known, it was Velma kept his practice together the last year or two. Tom was failin’ long before that gravel truck flattened him last October, but he just wouldn’t admit it. And now—” She shook her head again, mournfully. "Well, it’s pitiful, is what it is.”
"What’s the connection between Velma Mayfield and Opal Hogge?”
"Now, that I can’t tell you,” Fannie said. She chuckled. "They sure weren’t girlhood friends. Velma’s got a good twenty years on Opal Hogge. S’pose they’re related?” "Maybe.” I had just thought of something. "If so, Mae Belle Battersby will know. She’s Miss Velma’s niece.” "That’s right, I’d forgotten. MaeBelle’s mother was a Mayfield before she married into those shiftless Claypools. The Battersbys don’t live too far from here, you know.” “One more thing,” I said. “You mentioned that Lulu Burkhart was rumored to be involved with Jerry Jeff Cody. Has his name been connected with anybody else?”
"Well, there’s Ruby,” Fannie said with a diy chuckle. "Other than Ruby,” I said. “And Felicia Travis.”
“Not lately," Fannie said. She heaved herself out of her sling chair. “Clyde’s wavin’ at us. Let’s go see if that chicken’s fit to eat." v.
I could have waited and caught Mae Belle on the courthouse square, policing the parking meters, but since she lived nearby, I figured I might as well stop and see her.
It was still daylight when I parked in front of the Bat- tersby house, a gray frame cottage with red shutters, neady set behind a thick, prickly border of Texas lantana that was already blooming calico red and yellow. The Latin name of this attractive plant is Lantana horrida, because some people think the leaves smell awful, and because you have to arm yourself with elbow-length leather gauntlets to prune its thick, prickly branches. And also because its berries are toxic. But horrida or not, lantana doesn’t take a lot of water and butterflies grow giddy over it, which in my book is enough to earn its keep.
MaeBelle opened the front door. She was clad in a loose, hibiscus-print muumuu and she was fanning her sweaty face with a folded Enterprise. The door opened directly into a very small, very warm living room that smelled richly of onions. I sidestepped a fully extended recliner in which lay a heavy-set man with several days’ worth of stubble, a small fan whirring on the lamp table beside him. Two bare-legged preschoolers, their hair so blond it was white, were eating watermelon at an oilcloth- covered table in the adjacent dining room.
"That’s Lester,” MaeBelle said, gesturing at the man in the recliner. Lester didn't move. “The kids belong to my youngest, Jamie. She works on Sundays and the day care is closed, so they come here."
“I’m Lissa,” the little girl informed me, kicking her legs very fast. She jabbed the boy with her spoon. “He’s Peter. He’s a dork.”
“Not,” Peter replied placidly. He was fat and short, and his elbows were propped on the table, chin almost resting on his watermelon, eyes half closed.
“You are too a dork,” Melissa retorted. “I said so.” She spooned some watermelon into her mouth and spit a seed, expertly, onto Peter’s plate.
"Who cares?” Slowly, deliberately, Peter put the tip of his spoon on the seed, flipped it off his plate, and went on
eating. His eyelids didn’t even flicker.
"That kid’ll never get ulcers,” I said to Mae Be lie. “He has the gift of ignoring interruptions.”
“Like his grandpop.” Maebelle sighed, with a glance at Lester. "Surely t’ God it musta been harder when I had three of my own this size, but I guess I forgot. I do love ’em, God bless, but they wear me plumb out. Can’t hardly wait for Monday so’s I kin put on my uniform an’ go back to givin' parkin’ tickets.” Still fanning herself, she led the way through a small, hot kitchen, the counter cluttered with a day’s worth of dirty dishes and a skillet that had held fried onions, and opened a screen door. "Let’s sit on the porch. The durn air conditioner went out yesterday— alius on a weekend, you know.”
On the west side of the house, the porch was only marginally cooler than the stuffy indoors. MaeBelle went to a spigot and turned it on and a sprinkler out in the yard began to arc spray back and forth. She sank down into a plastic chair and motioned to me to take the other one. "Whut can I do for you, Miz Bayles? Information, you said you was after?”
"Yes. I’m doing a little project on some of the old folks at the Manor, and I was curious about your aunt Velma.” My explanation (partly a lie, mostly an evasion) might be vague, but I didn’t think MaeBelle would question it.
"Well, I’m glad you picked Aunt Velma.” Mae Belle’s tone was reminiscent. "She was a corker, she was, in her day. Mind like a whip. An old maid, you know. My mother used to say Aunt Velma was married to her job. Mr. Periy couldn’t of got along without her. Kept his office straight, records in order.”
"Did she grow up around here?”
"Over in New Braunfels. Got two years at the teacher’s college in San Marcos and taught grade school there for a while, then moved to Pecan Springs an’ started workin’ in Mr. Perry’s law office. I was just a little thing, no bigger’n Lissa, but I remember she bought me a doll out of her first paycheck. She always told me I'd grow up an' amount to somethin’.” MaeBelle’s round face beamed. "An’ now I got me this job as parkin' meter attendant, which pays a real good salary, plus hospital insurance an’ retirement an’ my uniform.” She gestured proudly. "An’ you know what, Miz Bayles? I paid off this house last month. All by myself, too, 'cause Lester hurt his back liftin’ a case of beer an’ hasn’t worked in a couple years.”
Chile Death Page 14
