Holly Blues

by ALBERT, SUSAN WITTIG

  “You’re not inviting her to supper!” McQuaid exclaimed, alarmed.

  “Yes, I’m inviting her to supper. She’s Brian’s mother.”

  “I wish you’d stop saying that. I’d like to forget.”

  China chuckled. “Just don’t forget Caitlin. Soccer field, four o’clock.”

  “I’ll remember,” he replied huffily. Actually, he was looking forward to picking Caitlin up. He planned on asking the soccer coach if they needed a volunteer. He’d helped to coach Brian’s team when the boy was in middle school. It would be a chance to encourage Caitlin, who spent too much time alone in her room. Reading was good, sure, but she needed to get more physical exercise. Not that he wanted to push her into competition, just get her moving more, get her out with other girls her age. She needed friends who could help her forget.

  “Thanks, McQuaid,” China said seriously. “I love you.”

  “Love you, too.” As soon as he had put down the phone he remembered that he had forgotten to tell her about going to Omaha for Charlie. Not the best time for a trip, with the holiday coming up—even worse, with Sally-the-Bad-Penny on the scene. Or Sally and Juanita. Or Sally, Juanita, and some hippie chick with a duffle bag. He grinned ruefully. Destitute Dottie.

  And then he thought, Well, maybe not. Maybe it was good timing. While he was in Omaha, Sally could rediscover her inner mother, spend a couple of days with Brian, maybe the weekend, and then be on her way wherever she was going.

  But that was a cop-out. And anyway, it wouldn’t be that easy. Nothing was ever that easy with Sally. He rubbed his forehead with his fingers, feeling the headache behind his eyes. She wouldn’t show up just before Christmas unless she meant to hang around until after the holiday. And of course, she’d have to pick this year, when everything was sort of up in the air. China was worried about cash flow. He was trying to decide whether to take Lyle’s offer of a second course for the spring semester or put more effort into marketing his agency. Caitlin was getting used to living with two grown-ups again plus a big brother. Brian was getting used to having a little sister.

  And Sally? Well, as far as he was concerned, Sally at Christmastime was pure disaster. Brian would be on edge when his mother was around, wanting to please her, but deep inside, knowing she didn’t really care. Sally, always the performer with a love for the dramatic, would hog all the attention, so Caitlin would slip back into the shadows. They might even be treated to a surprise visit from Juanita or from this new character, this hippy, whoever she was. And China . . .

  He sighed. He loved China with all his heart—loved her quick mind, loved her firm, responsive body, loved the way she loved him. But it could not be said that patience was one of her virtues. Before long, Sally would begin bitching about something inconsequential. China would be annoyed. China would tell her where she could go and what she could do when she got there. And he would be caught in the middle.

  His grading pencil had rolled onto the floor. He picked it up and went back to the exam with something like relief. All things considered, it was probably a good thing that he was grading papers tonight and going to Omaha tomorrow, before the war broke out.

  He might be a coward, but at least he’d be out of the line of fire.

  Chapter Three

  There are hundreds of species of hollies, native to every continent except Australia and Antarctica. They come in all sizes and shapes, from tiny rounded shrubs only eight inches high to robust columnar trees seventy feet tall. Two of our Texas natives, yaupon holly and possumhaw holly (I. vomitoria and I. decidua), are suited to xeriscapes. The holly’s great variety and attractiveness, ease of maintenance, and value as a wildlife food all make the family useful in landscapes and gardens in all parts of the world. Plant the smaller shrubs around your house instead of the usual thirsty landscaping, and the taller trees and shrubs around the perimeter of your yard. They will grow into a dense privacy hedge that will effectively screen unwanted views and keep out unwelcome trespassers.

  China Bayles, “Hollies for Your Garden,”

  Pecan Springs Enterprise

  I finished talking to McQuaid and went back to working on my column until the lunch crowd, happy and no longer hungry, came into the shops to browse, buying enough to keep the cash register ringing at agreeable intervals. An hour later, Cass finished up in the kitchen and went off to deliver a batch of her gourmet meals to her regular customers: mostly singles who commute to jobs in Austin and don’t have time to cook, but want to eat healthy, good-tasting meals. Working out of our kitchen, Cass gives them what they want at less than they’d pay for a restaurant meal. Less fat, salt, and sugar, too, with most vegetables locally grown.

  Later in the afternoon, after Ruby got back from her visit to her mother at Castle Oaks, I took a basket and went out to the garden to harvest the last of the fall herbs. Our first frost is officially scheduled for mid-November, but autumn seems to be lengthening in the past few years (yes, Virginia, there really is such a thing as global warming). It’s not unusual for us to wait until the winter solstice for our first hard freeze. And if we’re extra lucky, December might even bring us a couple of inches of rain.

  But today, like many of our Texas cool-season days, was bright with sunshine. The leaves had fallen from the cedar elms and hackberries, but the live oaks were still hanging on to their foliage and the yaupon hollies—one of our native holly species—were bright with berries. The yaupon bears the unappetizing name of Ilex vomitoria, and its leaves and twigs contain about as much caffeine as China tea. If you ever run out of tea or coffee, you know where to look. Natives of southeastern North America brewed the leaves into a tea they called Asi, known to the colonists as “the black drink.” In some tribes, Asi is reported to have been used as a ritual emetic, meaning that the men (this was a guy thing, and women weren’t allowed to participate) drank buckets of the stuff and then threw it up. There’s some disagreement about this, however: a few anthropologists say that the men only threw up the tea if a woman happened on the scene and saw them drinking it. Seems extreme to me, but what do I know?

  Later, settlers brewed yaupon leaves as a caffeinated hot or cold drink, sometimes flavored with other fruits. I’ve drunk it myself, and it’s tasty, especially when you flavor it with a fruit. The red berries are said to be mildly toxic, but the birds, deer, raccoons, skunks, and armadillos don’t seem to care. After the first couple of freezes soften the fruits and make them more palatable, wildlife will have a royal feast. Until then, our native hollies are a feast for the eyes.

  Like neighboring New Braunfels, Pecan Springs was settled in the 1840s by German emigrants, which accounts for what’s called the “German vernacular” architecture you see so much of here in town. The century-old two-story limestone building that houses Thyme and Seasons, the Crystal Cave, and Thyme for Tea was built by a German master mason who knew his business so well that every piece of square-cut stone still fits snug and true. There’s a second floor, too, unfinished, that I’ve been thinking of renting out as retail space for crafters. In the meantime, I call it the “loft” and use it for drying herbs and storing supplies and out-of-season decorative items. The building sits about ten yards back from the street on an attractive, sunny lot. I bought it with the wad of cash that I took out of my retirement fund when I left the law firm, settled down to make the herb shop a paying proposition, and filled every inch of the lot with herb gardens, both for display and for harvesting.

  And yes, you are welcome to gather your own herbs. (If you didn’t happen to bring a basket and scissors, I’ll provide them.) As you walk along the mulched, brick-bordered paths, you’ll find a culinary garden planted with thyme, basil, dill, rosemary, sage, parsley—all the herbs you need to prepare dozens of delicious meals. The apothecary garden offers healing herbs: echinacea, comfrey, garlic, horehound, lavender, and roses, as well as more rosemary, dill, and thyme. (Many culinary herbs are also medicinal, and vice versa.)

  There are other gardens, as well: a dye ga
rden, a tea garden, a butterfly garden, a fragrance garden, and more. All this takes a heckuva lot of work, yes, but I have help from friends who trade a couple of hours’ work in the gardens for credits they can spend in the shop—an idea I got from the gardens at Mount Zion, the Shaker village that I visited with Martha Edmonds a few months ago. (If you’re interested, there’s always room for another helper at Thyme and Seasons.) And when I’m feeling anxious, a half hour of weeding or planting or harvesting seems soothing. Especially harvesting, which reminds me that the earth is abundant, even when I’m feeling the pinch of scarcity.

  With Sally on the scene, I was definitely in need of soothing. I had a big basket, so I clipped plenty of sage, lavender, rosemary, oregano, and savory, planning to hang them to dry in the loft. Parsley is a biennial here, and since it stays green all winter, there’s always fresh parsley for Cass’ kitchen. I kept myself occupied for a half hour, letting the autumn sun warm me, the earthy fragrances wash through me, and the chipper song of a chickadee cheer me. I would like to say that I didn’t once think of Sally, but that wouldn’t be exactly true. I stayed pretty busy not thinking about her, though.

  At the back of the lot, near the alley, is Thyme Cottage, where Ruby, Cass, and I teach classes and hold workshops. If you didn’t know, you’d never guess that the building—also made of stone—was originally built as a stable, in the long-ago days when everybody in Pecan Springs had at least one horse. When live horsepower was replaced by the gasoline engine, the stable became a garage. It was eventually renovated by the architect who also refurbished the main building, where our shops are located. He lived there for a time, so the stable-cum-garage-cum-cottage has a fully equipped kitchen and spacious main room with a fireplace and plenty of comfortable seating. A couple of years ago, I redecorated the large, airy bedroom that opens out onto the deck, so I can rent the place as a bed-and-breakfast when it’s not otherwise in use. It’s listed in the Pecan Springs B&B Guide and online, so the rentals have been coming fairly regularly.

  In fact, starting tomorrow and continuing until the day after New Year’s, the cottage would be occupied by Mr. Cowan’s middle-aged daughter, Hazel. Mr. Cowan lives with Miss Lula, a yappy Pekinese, in the house across the alley. Hazel feels the need to visit her father (one of the most crotchety old men you’d hope never to meet) a couple of times a year, but she draws the line at Miss Lula. I can’t say I blame her, because this tiny dog has the loudest and sharpest bark in Pecan Springs. Miss Lula can outbark the Great Dane who lives on the corner and the mezzo sopranos of the Methodist Choral Union when they’re winding up for the Hallelujah Chorus at the church down the street. Pound for pound, I’d even put her up against such operatic divas as Beverly Sills or Joan Sutherland, although I don’t think she could manage the repertoire. She’d give it a try, though. What Miss Lula lacks in versatility, she more than makes up for in volume and intensity of expression.

  Of course, when Hazel comes to visit, her father could board his dog at the Hill Country Kennel, where Ruby’s daughter Amy works. He could—but he won’t, because to do that, he’d have to acknowledge that Miss Lula is indeed a dog, a fact that seems to have escaped his attention. Miss Lula sleeps on the bed in Mr. Cowan’s guest room and snaps whenever she’s threatened with eviction. Hazel (who is betting that she will live longer than Miss Lula) refuses to argue with Miss Lula or her father, and stays where she has a bed to herself, in Thyme Cottage. It stands behind a tall holly hedge and has such thick walls that when you’re lying in bed with the doors and windows closed, you can barely hear Miss Lula taunting the squirrels.

  I parked my gathering basket on the deck and went to the kitchen to put the kettle on. I was ready for a cup of hot tea. Then I took a quick inspection tour through the cottage to make sure it was ready for Hazel. The bedroom looks very nice, I think. There’s a four-poster maple bed made up with lavender-scented sheets and spread with an antique Texas Star quilt that my mother found at a yard sale. There’s a scattering of red and blue quilted pillows on the bed; a mahogany dresser against one stone wall and a blue-painted rocking chair in the corner; a red and blue braided rug on the wood floor; wood shutters and curtains at the windows; and framed colored prints of herbs on the walls. A bookcase holds a couple dozen mysteries contributed by Ruby, who is a dues-paying member of Sisters in Crime. (Ruby grew up with Nancy Drew and prefers female detectives, like V. I. Warshawski, Annie Darling, and Stephanie Plum.) If mysteries don’t appeal, there’s a television, a DVD player, and a few DVD movies. (I’m telling you all this in case you or someone you know plans to be in the area and might be looking for a quiet, pleasant, affordable place to stay. Please spread the word.)

  I put several branches of rosemary, some stalks of lavender, and some trailing oregano stems into a crystal vase, filled it with water, and set it on the bedroom dresser. I checked the bathroom for towels and soap and the bathtub (the old-fashioned kind, with clawed feet) for general cleanliness, remembering with a little shudder that Rosalind Kotner had died in this room some years ago. This isn’t something I like to think about, but even though I have scrubbed away every trace of blood, the ugly memory comes back every now and then. Pecan Springs is an attractive, comfortable community, but life here is not always as cozy and crime-free as our diligent Chamber of Commerce likes to portray it. Sometimes people die before their time, helped to their end by someone else.

  I was reflecting on this criminal truth as I went back to the kitchen, took down a box of yerba mate tea bags, put one in a cup, poured hot water over it, and added a spoonful of honey. When I heard the front door open, I took down another cup, poured in hot water, and added another bag and honey. That was probably Ruby with the cereal, juices, and drinks that we stock for our guests, and it was time we both took a break. Yerba mate is a nutrient-rich tea made from the leaves of a South American holly, Ilex paraguarensis. The taste is similar to that of green tea, only stronger. It is traditionally drunk as a friendship tea, shared from a gourd that is passed from person to person. I didn’t have a gourd handy. Mugs would do just as well.

  I headed for the living room. But it wasn’t Ruby I saw.

  “I stopped in the shop and said I was looking for you,” Sally explained cheerfully, dropping her purse onto a chair. “They told me where you were.”

  “Oh,” I said, wishing “they” hadn’t been quite so helpful. “Well, maybe we can just talk here. Would that be okay?”

  “You betcha.” She turned, casting an admiring glance around her. “Gosh, this is a great place, China. I’ve seen it from the outside, but I’ve never actually been in it. What do you use it for?”

  “Classes and workshops, mostly. When we’re not scheduled, I rent it out as a bed-and-breakfast. It’s listed in the—”

  “Bed-and-breakfast?” Her eyes widened. “Gosh. You mean, like, people actually sleep here?”

  “I assume so,” I replied drily. “I don’t check the sheets, but—”

  But she wasn’t listening. Ponytail bobbing and without a by-your-leave, she was bouncing down the hall, poking her head into the bathroom, where I could hear her cooing admiringly over the claw-foot tub, and then into the bedroom, where she gave little squeals of pleasure. While she was gone, I went to the kitchen and fetched the yerba mate. A moment later, she was back, flopping into the chair by the fireplace.

  “I love it,” she announced, with an over-the-top enthusiasm. “The bathtub, the quilt, the rocking chair, everything. Even a TV! It’s totally, absolutely fab, China. And it just so happens that I’m looking for a place to stay. This would be perfect. I could hole up here for weeks.”

  I suppressed a shudder and handed her a mug of tea. “It’s as perfect as a lot of hard work can make it. But it just so happens that it’s rented. Starting tomorrow, until after the new year.” I didn’t say I’m sorry, because I wasn’t.

  She deflated. “Boo-hoo. You’re sure? I was really hoping—”

  “There are plenty of motels along I-35,” I interrupted.
“How long are you staying?”

  For weeks, she had said. Please, God, don’t let it be true. Please!

  “I don’t know.” She took a sip of her tea and her eyes popped open. “Yikes! What is this stuff?”

  “You don’t like it?” I asked evilly. “It’s a South American tea, traditionally drunk only among friends. If you’d rather have a soda or something . . .”

  “Among friends? Well, then, I’ll try it.” She sipped. “Actually, it’s good. You just have to get used to it, I guess.” She sipped again, then sighed and dropped what was left of her artificial gaiety. “I’m afraid a motel won’t work for me, China. I don’t have a car, and from I-35, it’s too far to walk.”

  I stared at her blankly, trying to figure this out. “No car?”

  “Well, I had a car. A really terrific Mini Cooper convertible, bright yellow.” A drawn-out, dramatic sigh, a little wave of her hand. “But I couldn’t make the payments. It was repo’d.”

  I asked the next reasonable question. “So how did you get here? To Pecan Springs, I mean. Did somebody bring you?”

  “Nobody brought me.” She sipped again. “I came on the bus.”

  The bus? I was nonplussed. Pecan Springs is pretty much like any other town. The things you have to do—work, shop, buy groceries, visit friends—are scattered all over, not clustered in a single neighborhood. You get in the car and you drive from one place to another, not as far as in a big city, maybe, and with a lot less traffic. But you do have to drive, which means you have to have a car. And if Sally didn’t have a car, how did she plan to visit Brian? As she knows, we live about ten miles outside of town. Too far to bike, even if I loaned her my bicycle.

  “Well, that’s okay,” I said, trying to come up with a work-around. “Darryl Perkins owns a used car lot here in town. I rented an old VW from him when I had car trouble last year. It wasn’t spiffy, but it wasn’t expensive, either. As I recall, it only cost—”