“Ouch,” Tyler said, now holding his arm. “Mosquitoes are bad today.”
“Not for me,” Zach said. “I put on some of my mom’s homemade calamine lotion. Watch this.” He lifted his arms in the air as if offering a blood smorgasbord to the mercenary bugs. “See? I’m protected. It’s like a shield over my arms.” As he spoke, I noticed a mosquito lighting on his arm.
“Right, dude,” Tyler said, knocking it off.
Another bug lighted on Zach’s arm and then another.
“I think it’s attracting them. Let’s get back to the car,” Leo said, gathering up our trash while the boys got the balls and bats. So much for entomological protection.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
We met at the Pecan Bayou Diner for lunch with Mark Garret, a friend of Leo’s from Dallas who would be our best man, and Elena, our maid of honor. Elena apologized as she came into the diner wearing her police uniform.
“Sorry, guys. You only have me for an hour,” she said. “George went home with a cold, and I’m working his shift.”
Birdie came up with four menus and glanced at the squad car parked in front of the restaurant. “Hope that doesn’t discourage the regulars,” she said.
“I’m doing you a favor, Birdie. I’ve seen some of your regulars,” replied Elena.
Birdie looked over at Mark and gasped, “You’re Mark Garret from Dallas Eyewitness News! I watch your weather report every morning.” Birdie leaned on the table to prevent an impending swoon. She quickly straightened her apron and ran her fingers through her freshly frosted hair.
“Uh, yes. Thank you for watching,” he said. An awkward silence passed between all of us.
“Birdie,” I whispered. “Can we look at the menus you’re holding?”
Birdie jumped. “Oh! I’m sorry.” She slapped them down on the table. “If you need anything,” her voice lowered significantly as her gaze zeroed in on Mark, “I mean anything, just let me know.”
“Thanks,” Mark said.
“Any time.” Birdie ran her finger along the edge of the table and turned on one foot. She glanced over her shoulder at Mark as she walked back to the kitchen. Once she got to the Formica counter on the other side of the diner, she grabbed another waitress and started whispering while looking back. The other waitress screamed and they both jumped up and down holding each other by the elbows.
“You seem to be quite the celebrity,” I said.
“I guess so,” said Mark. “I didn’t even know you could get our feed out here.”
“We do have some of the modern conveniences.”
“Don’t let it go to your head, Garret. Just remember who the groom is in this shindig,” Leo said, tapping Mark with his laminated menu.
“I can always count on Leo here to keep me humble. You know, you wouldn’t be so bad on my side of the camera.”
“Been there, done that,” Leo said. “I’m pretty happy researching storms, not acting them out.”
I hadn’t thought about the impact having a television weatherman in the group would have on our wedding. Surely the rest of the town wouldn’t be as silly as Birdie. She was between husbands, and to her he looked like one fine blue plate special.
“Do you get that a lot?” I asked.
“Not quite like that, but here and there people recognize me,” he said. “Mostly they blame me for the rain.”
“Well,” said Elena. “Now that you brought it up …” She was referring to the endless days of rain we had been having.
We had allowed the boys to sit at their own booth, the restaurant version of the kids’ table. They were doing their best to ignore us. They were two young men on the town taking time out of their busy schedules to get a bite to eat. They seemed to be behaving so I decided to let them be for now.
I took out my white notebook. “So, Mark, you’ve been measured for your tux up in Dallas?”
He saluted, feigning allegiance. “Yes ma’am.”
“And Elena, you’re getting to the last fitting of your dress next week?”
“Yes,” she said. “It will be hard to get to with all of the details after the accident with Mr. Stokes.”
“Accident?” Mark asked, closing his menu.
“Our florist was stung to death by bees,” Leo said.
“Really? That seems pretty strange for this time of year. Did he uncover a nest?”
“No, he had beehives,” I said, “although it amazed me he had on very little protective covering. He used them for his flowers. His wife said he had just brought in some new bees because the old ones had died off.”
“But it seems so strange that if he had done this procedure many times before, why they would suddenly be alarmed enough to attack this time?” Leo said. “It couldn’t be any of those Africanized killer bees, could it?”
“Bees only attack if their alarm pheromone has been triggered,” said Mark. “That’s why most beekeepers use smoke to stunt that pheromone. Was he using a smoking can?”
“There was a little metal can on the ground near him,” I said.
“Then that should have kept the bees at bay.”
“It wasn’t smoking when we found him,” I said.
“Yes, but I smelled smoke in the air,” said Leo. “It made the back of my throat start to tickle.”
“So he was probably using smoke,” I said.
“And,” said Mark, “the bees shouldn’t have been alarmed.”
“Who knows,” Elena said, unfolding her napkin. “He was a grumpy old man that was hard to deal with. We got called out there about once a week. Something was always wrong with that guy.”
“I’ve been hearing that from several people,” I said. “Seems like there wasn’t anybody in town who hadn’t had a run-in with him.”
“Including you.” Leo pointed at me.
“Including me.”
“So everybody at that funeral will be crying for joy,” Elena said.
“I didn’t even know this man, but it sure seems like all of you are being a little callous about his death,” said Mark.
Birdie came back and started taking our orders. After we had all listed off our choices, Birdie leaned over to Mark. “Before you go, I’m going to give you a bag of my pecan pralines. I made them myself. It’s on the house, for you.”
“That’s very kind of you.” He leaned up to her and whispered, “but the camera adds ten pounds, you know.”
She nodded knowingly as if she dealt with that problem daily. Birdie gave him a thumbs-up as she backed away.
“You have a fan,” Elena said.
The bell jingled on the diner’s door, and in stepped Nancy Olin and her daughter, Prissy, holding a stack of bridal magazines. Upon seeing us, Prissy straightened her shoulders and twisted her mouth in a sour expression.
“Who is that?” Leo whispered in my ear.
“That is Prissy Olin,” I said.
“Why does she look angry at us?” Elena said.
“Probably because I dared to have a wedding on the same day she is having hers.”
Nancy Olin waved her hand in the air toward Birdie. Birdie rolled her eyes at us and hurried to their table.
Before Birdie could put any menus down, Nancy pushed them back and started ordering. “We’ll have two spinach salads and two glasses of water with lemons on the side, please.” Birdie scrambled to get her order pad out of her apron and write down the salads.
“Mama, I’m hungry. Don’t order me a salad,” Prissy said as she put down her menu. “I’ll have a cheeseburger.” Birdie scratched out the salad and started scribbling cheeseburger.
“No, you won’t. You have to fit into that wedding gown, young lady,” said Nancy. “She’ll have a salad.” Birdie scratched out the cheeseburger and started writing salad.
“Mother! I’ll eat whatever I want. Lavonne can let it out.”
Birdie ripped the page out of her order book and wadded it up. After putting it in her pocket, she stood there waiting for the final decision. Nancy Olin touche
d her temple and closed her eyes, looking like she might have a headache coming on. She looked up at Birdie. “Bring her the cheeseburger.” Birdie turned to go to the kitchen. Nancy Olin placed her hand on her arm before she could go a step.
“Aren’t you going to write that down?”
“Somehow, I think I have it memorized,” Birdie said.
As Birdie left, Nancy let out a sigh. “Honestly, Prissy, sometimes I wonder if I haven’t been too lenient with you. If something upsets your plans, nothing is beyond you to get what you want.”
“Just remember that, Mama, and we’ll always have this loving bond to share,” said Prissy as she savagely ripped open a tiny packet of crackers.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
During the next week, my life resumed a bit of normality. The rain continued off and on while Leo and Tyler headed back to Dallas and Zach and I returned to school and work. I concentrated on writing a series of columns on homemade lotions. In this article, I was trying to make a simple hand lotion out of glycerin and rosewater, two ingredients I picked up down at the drug store.
After learning of Lenny Stokes’s death, Mr. Andre said he would call in our flowers at Baskets of Bluebonnets. I decided to call them to get an idea of the price. Hopefully they wouldn’t cost too much more than Lenny had quoted.
“The Livingston/Fitzpatrick wedding, you said? Let me check,” said the florist.
I heard a scuffling of papers in the background and then a clear curse word.
“Miss Livingston? I don’t know quite how to tell you this, but your sales order got stuck to another. I told Jimmy not to eat at the register. We peeled it off the Olin invoice.”
“Oh, well you have it now. That’s all that matters. You scared me there for a minute. I can’t imagine not having flowers for my own wedding,” I said. There was an uncomfortable pause on the other end as the florist cleared his throat.
“Well, here’s the thing. We didn’t realize we had your wedding order, and since the time that it was called in, we’ve become fully booked. Between Prissy’s wedding and the holiday, every floral designer we have is busy. Ma’am, you do know what day of the year that is? Valentine’s Day is every florist’s Black Friday. I appreciate your business and all, but I’m not going to sugar coat it – our store is crazy that day. There won’t be a daisy to be had. Do you have someone in your wedding party who can arrange flowers?”
“Well, we were going to go with Lenny Stokes and … he’s no longer available.” I didn’t want to go through explaining Lenny’s death on the phone and hoped the man would think he had at least scraped a little business from him.
“Don’t tell me Lenny has so much business he can’t handle it,” he said. “Without him, we’d never get through the slow months. I think he’s personally riled up half the county. The man has absolutely no sales skills. Shoot, he doesn’t even have people skills. So what happened with him, or do I even need to ask?”
“He died,” I said quietly.
I heard a coughing noise on the other end as if the florist at Bluebonnets had taken a drink of coffee between rants on Lenny Stokes.
“He died? What did he die of? That old coot’s too mean to die.”
“Bees. He was stung to death.”
“I’ll be. Hold on a minute.” He yelled the news of Lenny’s tragic death across the shop. I thought I heard the faint echo of clapping. The florist then returned to the phone. “Well, it’s a shame,” he said. “Some of our best customers have been people Lenny burned.”
“Do you know a lot about bees,” I asked, “I mean, working around flowers and all?”
“A little. I know you got to have them to get any blooms.”
“How about attacking people?”
“They only attack when they’re threatened,” said the florist. “Lenny must have done something really stupid like swat at one.”
“You’d think anyone with as many years of experience as Lenny would have been smarter than that,” I said.
“Who knows? They probably stung him out of spite.”
“About the flowers,” I continued, “you really can’t help me?”
“No, I’m afraid not,” he said, “and now that I know Lenny’s out of the picture, I had better start stocking up for the wedding season. Have you thought about having someone bring the flowers in from one of the cities?”
I guess I could have Leo bring them from Dallas, but there was still a chance they would be wilted during the hours it would take to get to Pecan Bayou.
“You might want to see if Lenny’s wife could fill your order,” he continued. “I mean, they still have a greenhouse full of flowers, right? Oh, and it would probably help if there was some sort of floor plan of the venue sketched out for the flower placement.”
“Martha might be a whole lot easier to deal with than her husband ever was,” I admitted. “I guess I’ll give her a call.”
“It’s so weird how he died. That has to be every florists’ nightmare,” said the florist. “Well, that and running out of green floral foam. Something must have triggered the bees’ internal alarms.”
I just hoped and prayed it didn’t have anything to do with the calamine lotion.
******
As I ended the call, I jumped back as the phone rang in my hand.
“Yo, Betsy.” Rocky Whitson was on the other end.
“Hi, Rocky. I just finished up my article. I was making a few calls and was about to email it to you.”
“That’s fine. Is it another one of those homemade lotion things?”
I wasn’t sure if I liked the way he was describing my work.
“Yes,” I said, “this time it’s for a moisturizing lotion. Why do you ask?”
“Well, I was just sitting here thinkin’.” I could imagine Rocky leaning back in his old squeaky chair, chewing on his already-battered Ticonderoga.
“About?”
“About Lenny Stokes. He had a jar of homemade cream out there on the porch rail. Would that be something concocted from your recipe?”
“How did you know about that?” I said.
“I’ve got my sources.”
“No, you don’t. You were nosing around out there.”
“Maybe,” said Rocky. “My point is, if Lenny Stokes spread your homemade goo all over himself and then got attacked by killer bees, you might just have a problem, missy.”
I had to give it to Rocky – he was the first to put it together besides me. If he could pick up on this potential problem, then it wouldn’t be long before others did too.
“Don’t you mean, ‘we’ have a problem?” I said. “It was printed in your paper, after all.”
“Well, that’s where you’re wrong,” said Rocky. “I have a disclaimer at the front of every edition that my reporters are responsible for the accuracy of their own work.”
“Say what? You’re kidding me, right?”
“Truth is, I’ve fielded several calls this morning coming from nervous ladies in Martha Stokes’s church group. Seems she told them about Lenny using the calamine on his rash. They’re all worried that their loved ones will be chased after by a swarm.”
“That’s crazy,” I said. “All the lotion had in it was a few simple ingredients. I’ve used it on Zach for mosquito bites and never had a problem.”
“Yes, but Zach doesn’t tend to bees, now does he?”
“No.” He had a point. “But he does play outside.” I decided it wouldn’t be such a great idea to tell Rocky about him being attacked by mosquitoes at the ballpark. “You tell these women that whatever happened to Lenny had nothing to do with the homemade calamine lotion.”
“That’s what I’ve been saying. In the meantime, you need to double-check your facts. Is there any possibility that the combination of Lenny’s body chemistry and the ingredients in the lotion could have combined to create something that made the bees go ballistic?”
“His body chemistry?” I asked.
“He was awful sour.”
“I
don’t think I can help you too much on that, Rocky, but for you, I’ll at least check.”
“Or I can forward all these calls to you, Miss Happy Hinter.”
“I’ll check.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
I threw together one of my tater tot casseroles and headed over to Martha Stokes’s farm. The rain had finally given us a reprieve for a while. The warmth of the sun was seeping into every little brown blade of grass, promising the return of spring. There was a dumpster now parked up near the house, and it was filled to the top with old boxes, furniture and junk. Martha came around the corner holding a paint roller. Fresh white paint was splattered on her work shirt. Her whole demeanor had changed from the woman who had called me on the phone what seemed like a long time ago.
“Oh Betsy, it’s you,” she said, sounding relieved. “Sorry, been a little paranoid since Lenny died. I think we had a prowler out here last night. Just lucky for me we always keep the shotgun by the door. I came out on the porch with it pointed into the dark, and whatever it was scurried away. Probably just some animal looking to dig through the trash cans.” She eyed the covered dish.
“Oh,” I said. “I brought this for you.”
“Thanks, dear. I’ll put it in the freezer. With all the casseroles I’ve received from the church, I won’t have to cook until summer,” she said, putting down the roller in a paint pan.
“Looks like you’ve been busy,” I said. The trash that had been in the yard was now picked up, the stray shoots of grass that had been growing up in every crack around the house had been weed-whacked, and a new coat of paint now glistened on the boards of the old farmhouse.
“Work helps. I’ve lived my whole life in this old house listening to Lenny, putting up with his moods, trying to make our business work. After he died last week, it suddenly occurred to me that I no longer had to live like that. I could live any way I damn well pleased.”
Buzzkill (Pecan Bayou Series) Page 9
