by Donna Ball
Ida Mae shouted after him, “Don’t slam the—”
Noah reappeared before she could finish, an angelic smile on his face. “Farley’s coming,” he announced, and this time closed the door with barely a squeak.
“Hope he’s got my pressure cooker fixed,” Ida Mae grumbled as the sound of the sputtering pickup truck grew closer. “It’s been two weeks he’s been messin’ with it.”
“The safest two weeks I’ve ever spent in this house,” Cici said, without looking up from the magazine. “That thing is scary.”
“Even scarier now that Farley has worked on it,” Lindsay added.
“Wimps.” Bridget got up from the table. “Cooking is not for the faint of heart.” She went to the kitchen drawer where they kept the household cash and withdrew a ten-dollar bill. “Ida Mae, let’s pack up the rest of the breakfast muffins for Farley, okay?”
“You spoil that man.” Ida Mae began piling the dandelion greens into the sink.
“Well, it seems the least we can do, after all he does for us.”
Farley—none of them knew whether that was his first name or his last—was their closest neighbor, at three miles north, and their all-around handyman. Whether it was repairing a broken pipe, replacing a single roof tile, or plowing their driveway after a snowfall, he always charged ten dollars: no more, no less.
Ida Mae turned on the taps to rinse the greens and took the plate of leftover muffins from the cabinet. “Somebody needs to go get me a basket.”
Lindsay got up and went to the pantry.
Cici said, “Ida Mae, the magazine article is out, did you see it?”
Ida Mae was a tall, rangy woman of indeterminate age with iron gray hair and a brusque manner that left most people completely intimidated. Today she wore cotton jeans and steel-toed work boots underneath a belted red flannel dress and a pilled blue sweater, all topped with a cotton apron printed with bright red roosters. Her weathered face showed absolutely no signs of interest as she glanced over her shoulder at Bridget. “You gonna help me pack up these muffins or not?”
Rebel, their antisocial border collie, charged forth with a murderous round of barking as Farley’s truck pulled around the drive, and Bridget cast an anxious glance toward the back door before she hurried to take the basket that Lindsay had retrieved from the pantry. Rebel had been raised by Farley and had, in fact, been his gift to them when they discovered they had inherited a flock of sheep. But no one trusted the dog not to bite the hand that had fed him for the first three years of his life—particularly since he regularly tried to bite theirs.
Cici got up and came to help, the magazine in her hand. “Look, they even said something about you.”
“I’ll bet you never thought you’d see yourself in a magazine,” Lindsay encouraged.
And Bridget added, tossing muffins into the basket, “It’s a really nice article, Ida Mae.”
Ida Mae turned off the faucet and shook out the greens, spreading them out to dry on paper towels.
“You worked so hard helping us get the house ready for the photographers,” Cici said, urging the magazine on her. “Don’t you even want to look?”
Ida Mae reached deliberately for a dish towel and took her time drying her hands. She looked at Bridget, sourly, then turned the look on Cici and Lindsay. She took the magazine.
The three women watched her closely as she slowly turned the pages, anticipating comments about “Dang fool Yankee trash tramping all over m‘flower beds” and “fuss and bother just so a bunch o’ rich biddies can look at how we live” and “working like yard hands for three damn weeks just for this?” Not to mention the inevitable derision over whatever mistakes had surely been made in the recipe, or the quotes. They waited, hardly aware of holding their breaths, until she flipped the magazine closed and returned it to Cici.
“Right nice,” was all she said, and they stared at her as she placed the last of the muffins in the basket and turned back to the sink. “Thought these greens’d make a good salad with some nuts and cheese. How’s that chicken coming?”
“Oh, um ...” It was at that moment that Farley knocked politely on the screen door, and Bridget glanced anxiously toward the oven as she waved at him. “Hi, Farley.”
“Afternoon, ladies.”
Farley was a big man in faded overalls and a camo cap, with a ginger-colored beard and a perpetual wad of chewing tobacco forming a small lump in one cheek. He carried a highly polished steel pressure cooker under one arm, and a soda can in the other hand. He spat a stream of brown juice into the can before adding, “Got your cooker.”
Cici grabbed an oven mitt and opened the oven to check on the chicken. Bridget opened the screen door and stepped aside as Farley came in, leaving his soda can on the porch rail. He set the pressure cooker on the counter and Bridget handed him a ten-dollar bill. “Thank you so much for fixing this,” she said. “Canning season is coming up and I don’t know what we’d do without it.”
Farley swept off his cap, mindful of being indoors, and tucked it into his back pocket as he somberly took out his wallet and placed the ten-dollar bill inside. “Weren’t no problem,” he replied. He added, without looking up, “Hear you ladies got your pictures in the paper.”
Cici closed the oven door and smiled at him. “It was a magazine,” she corrected. “Would you like to see it?”
“No thank you, ma‘am,” he replied, and returned his wallet securely to his back pocket. “Don’t have much use for that kind of foolishness.”
Lindsay raised an amused eyebrow but said nothing.
Ida Mae retrieved her pressure cooker and Bridget took the basket of muffins from the counter. “These are for you, Farley,” she said. “They’re fresh made this morning. Wild strawberry.”
He looked surprised as he accepted the muffins, even though Bridget almost always had some kind of baked goods for him whenever he came by. “Why,” he said, “that’s right good of you, Miss Bridget.”
Bridget smiled. “I hope you enjoy them.” She smiled as she added, “See you in church Sunday?”
It was almost a running joke, since everyone knew the only time Farley went to church was on Easter and Christmas. But he looked back at her somberly and replied, “No, ma‘am, I don’t reckon you will. But I thank you for the thought just the same.”
He removed his cap from his pocket, nodded at Cici and Lindsay, and left with his basket of muffins, settling the cap on his head as he reached the back steps.
“Strange bird,” murmured Cici as she heard the truck engine start.
“Oh, he’s a good soul,” replied Bridget fondly, smiling after him. “Just lonely, I think.”
“I hope he knows how to fix a pressure cooker, is all,” Ida Mae said, and there was a certain amount of menace to her tone as she returned from placing the appliance on its shelf in the pantry.
“For ten dollars,” Lindsay cautioned, “I wouldn’t expect too much.”
But the look Ida Mae gave her suggested consequences too dire for words should her prediction happen to be correct.
Cici started gathering up the magazines. “Well,” she said. “It’s been quite a day. But I guess it’s back to scattering chicken feed and shoveling sheep manure.”
“Damn,” said Lindsay, “and I just had my nails done.”
Bridget sighed. “Well, it was fun while it lasted.”
But just then the phone rang, and the fun, such as it was, had just begun.
3
Opportunity Knocks
Bridget grinned as she reached for the telephone. “It’s probably the Today show.”
Cici held out her hand for the telephone with an air of resignation. “It’s Lori,” she said. “Doesn’t that child ever attend classes?”
But the voice on the other end of the telephone was not Lori’s.
“Paul!” she exclaimed. And to the others, “It’s Paul! Wait, you’re on speaker.”
She pushed the button and Paul’s voice, over a hundred miles away, declared, “
Well? Now was it worth the trouble?”
Paul and his partner Derrick had been neighbors of the ladies when they all lived on Huntington Lane in Maryland, and had thrown themselves wholeheartedly into support of the Ladybug Farm project. It was Paul, the author of a popular syndicated style and fashion column, who had suggested an article on Ladybug Farm to his friend, an editor at Virginians at Home. The idea had been met with initial resistance from the members of the household who actually knew what it would take to prepare the old house for a photo session. But they had eventually been worn down, if not entirely overruled, by Lori. Eight months later, the fruits of their labors had seen print, but as to whether or not the herculean feat of preparing for the article was worth the effort...
“The verdict is still out,” Cici told Paul.
“But it was a great article,” Lindsay added.
Bridget closed the oven door. “Eighty-seven comments on the blog!” she announced happily. “No, wait—ninety!”
“Ninety-one,” Paul said. “I just sent a comment.”
Ida Mae harrumphed at the sink, wrapped the dandelion greens in paper towels, and stalked to the pantry.
“The phone has been ringing all day,” Lindsay told him. “Everyone in town thinks we’re celebrities.”
“That’s because for the past three months you’ve been telling everyone we know the exact day the magazine was going to hit the stands,” Bridget said.
“Like you haven’t?”
“The photos were great,” Paul said. “You all looked beautiful:”
“Lori is convinced this is the beginning of a whole new enterprise,” Cici said, laughing a little.
“Well, you never know.”
“I just got your comment,” Bridget exclaimed. She paused to read it. “What do you mean, do we ever do special events?”
“Well...” The careful excitement in Paul’s voice caused an escalation of alertness in his listeners. “As a matter of fact, something very interesting has come up. Do you remember my editor’s sister’s mother-in-law’s best friend, the one who has the place in the Hamptons that Derrick and I visited last summer?”
“No,” said Cici, “but if this is an invitation to join you this summer, we accept.”
“It’s better,” Paul said.
Lindsay drew close to the phone. “You’ve got my attention.”
“As it turns out,” Paul went on, “she has a niece who’s getting married in June and there’s been some kind of disaster with the venue for the reception—flooding or mice or crabgrass or something.”
“Crabgrass?” Bridget interrupted, eyebrows lifted.
“It was supposed to be a garden ceremony” Paul explained, “and of course trying to find a replacement at this late date is out of the question, and the whole family is half hysterical about it, naturally.”
“Naturally” Cici murmured.
“So, Julie, my editor, happened to be in my office this morning when my copy of the magazine came in, and we were admiring the pictures of the house and garden, and Julie happened to mention what a perfect place for a wedding that would be, and I remember that you had actually talked about opening the place up for weddings at one time ...”
“For a minute!” Cici corrected, alarmed. “We talked about it for a minute!”
“That was before we had a vineyard to take care of,” Lindsay added quickly.
“And wine jams to make,” Bridget said.
“And long before we knew how much trouble it was just to get this place ready for a magazine reporter, much less a stranger’s wedding.”
Paul was silent for a moment. “What a shame.” There was a note of exaggerated regret in his voice that immediately made the women suspicious. “But if you’re not interested, you’re not interested.”
“We’re not,” Cici said firmly.
“Besides,” Lindsay added, “we’re way out here in the middle of Virginia. Why would anyone with a place in the Hamptons want to have her wedding here?”
“Well, for one thing, they live in Fairfax, not the Hamptons. And apparently, it’s exactly what the bride’s been look ing for—the fountains, the gardens, the staircase...”
“You told her about it?” Lindsay’s expression was both flattered and dismayed.
“She saw the magazine,” Paul assured her.
Bridget said, “That staircase would make a spectacular entrance for a bride, wouldn’t it?”
Cici smiled. “The minute we first saw the place, I pictured Lori walking down it in a white dress.”
“And the bay window in the living room would be the perfect place for a bridal arch,” Lindsay said. “We could open the pocket doors and seat a hundred people.”
“Are we still talking about Lori’s wedding?” Cici ventured uncertainly.
Bridget said curiously to the telephone, “How many guests are we talking about, anyway? And how would they get here?”
“That,” replied Paul airily, “is not my problem. I’m just the messenger. All I know is that the bride was quite impressed with the magazine photographs and my description of the place—not to mention the cachet of having her wedding in an historic house that’s been featured in a magazine. And Bridget, I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if there wasn’t some catering in it for you—a great opportunity to get your name out there.”
A light came into Bridget’s eyes. “That’s right,” she said. “They would have to have it catered locally.”
“And you are the only local caterer,” Lindsay pointed out. “The only one with a blog, anyway.”
“I could do all the gift baskets,” Bridget volunteered.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Cici held up a firm and staying hand. “You’re talking about a society wedding here. Do you have any idea what’s involved?”
“Not so society” Paul pointed out quickly. “From what I hear they are really trying to keep it simple. A garden wedding, family members and close friends. All they want is a nice spot for their wedding photographs.”
“Well, I’m sure they’ll have no problem finding a simple garden in someone’s backyard in Fairfax,” Cici said.
“With a vineyard and a mountain view in the background?” Paul interjected. “And a grand staircase and an antique rose garden with fountains and reflecting pools?”
“Good heavens,” Lindsay said, looking pleased. “You make us sound like the Taj Mahal.”
“Which we’re not,” Cici pointed out.
“Well, it’s up to you,” Paul said. “I just hate to think of that poor girl’s heart being broken again. She was so excited when I spoke to her on the phone.”
“This really is the perfect spot for a wedding,” Bridget said, a little wistfully.
Paul asked, “Did I mention the budget?”
Cici was immediately alert. “What budget?”
“Well, the father of the bride was hoping not to exceed twenty thousand for the reception.”
“Dollars?” exclaimed Lindsay. “For one day?”
“They call that simple?” Bridget gasped.
Cici simply stared at the telephone speaker.
“Washington dollars,” Paul pointed out. “And that’s about average. If you can quote anything under that, they’ll consider it a steal.”
Bridget looked at Cici. So did Lindsay. Cici cleared her throat. “Well, I guess it wouldn’t hurt to meet with them. When can they drive out?”
“How about tomorrow?” Paul suggested quickly.
“Tomorrow!” Bridget jumped back to avoid the swinging door to the pantry as Ida Mae reentered the kitchen. “Couldn’t you give us a little notice?”
Ida Mae scowled at the telephone. “We having company?”
“Hi, Ida Mae,” Paul greeted her cheerfully. “And don’t worry you won’t even know we’re there.”
Lindsay said, “This is not exactly a cottage, you know. This place takes a little while to get ready for inspection. Couldn’t we do it next week?”
“We’re on a short deadline here,” P
aul pointed out. “The wedding is in three weeks.”
“Three weeks! Who plans a wedding in three weeks?”
“The invitations went out last month. They really only have a matter of days to get change-of-venue cards out, so they have to make a decision quickly.”
Cici said, “I don’t know...”
“It will just be the bride and her mother. All they need to do is walk around the property and talk to you about what they have in mind.”
The three women glanced at each other. “That doesn’t sound too hard,” Bridget offered.
“I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to talk,” Lindsay agreed.
“Perfect!” They could practically see the sparkle in Paul’s eyes over the telephone line. “I knew my favorite girls wouldn’t let me down. And I have a feeling you’re going to be very happy you did this. We’ll be there about lunchtime.”
Ida Mae muttered, “Good thing we won’t know you’re here.”
Paul laughed. “Good-bye, my darlings! I’ll see you tomorrow!”
The three women looked at each other for a moment. “Well,” said Cici at last.
“Yeah,” said Lindsay, and she grinned. “I guess we are famous. You know there’s going to be no living with that daughter of yours now. It couldn’t have been better if she had orchestrated it all herself.”
“She practically did,” Cici said.
Bridget thought out loud. “I should bake something. Maybe a seven-layer lemon-raspberry torte. We still have some raspberries in the freezer. And a shrimp and asparagus quiche.”
Ida Mae opened the container of thawed peaches and dumped them into a mixing bowl. “Where’re you gonna get the shrimp?”
“Ham and asparagus quiche,” Bridget amended, her eyes glowing as the menu took shape in her mind. “And beaten biscuits with dill butter—no, I know! Scones with those stone cherries we dried last year. Ida Mae, let’s save those dandelion greens for a salad tomorrow.”
“Got a yard full of them.” She poured sugar over the peaches. “You gonna make a cobbler or roll out a crust?”
“Crust. I wish the raspberries were in.”
“You making a pie and a cake?”
