by Anne George
"What time will you be home?" I asked.
"I'll call you after a while. George is going to Subway to get us some sandwiches."
"Tell him to get you turkey, and very little mayonnaise. Fat-free, if they have it."
Sister, sitting on the edge of the bed, rolled her eyes. "Good Lord, Patricia Anne," she said as I hung up the phone. "Tell him to get you turkey," she mimicked my voice.
"Shut up."
"And very little mayonnaise. Fat-free."
I threw a hairbrush at her. She ducked, and it hit the wall.
"Look at that," she said. "You chipped the plaster."
"I did not." I had pulled off my glasses to try on the blouses. "Did I?"
"Just a little bit. Try on the sage blouse first."
"Too expensive," I grumbled, but I was already reaching for it.
Sister stretched out on the bed. "What are you having for supper?"
"Chicken salad. You can stay." I slipped the blouse over my head. "This has to be dry-cleaned. I hate to pay dry cleaners a fortune."
"Don't sweat."
"Girls? You there?" Georgiana's voice down the hall.
"Come on back. We're in the bedroom," Sister called.
Georgiana stood in the doorway, suddenly green as my blouse.
"The bathroom's right there," I pointed quickly.
Georgiana disappeared, shoulders hunched.
"Gotta watch that Black Jack," Sister said.
"She's got a virus."
"I hope she doesn't spread it around." She eyed the blouse. "That looks good. I like the way it drapes across the front. Makes you look like you have some boobs. See how it does with the jacket."
I complied.
"Now try on the other one."
I complied again. By the time Georgiana had tottered from the bathroom, I had decided that I would keep both blouses. One would be a Mother's Day present, and one was for checking on Bubba Cat when Sister went to Las Vegas for some kind of stockholders' convention next month. I informed Sister of this fact.
"I don't see why you can't call it what it is—charity," she said,
I grabbed Sister's foot and mashed it forward and down. Hard. She yelped.
"Are you two having a disagreement?" Georgiana stood in the doorway again.
"No," we said together.
"Are you feeling better?" I asked.
"Some. I think I'd better run along home right away, though. I'm sorry to have bothered you. I can't tell you what hearing that voice did to me."
"It shook me up, too," I said.
"A prank," Mary Alice said, standing up and putting her weight gingerly on the foot I had mashed. "You just go home, take some Pepto-Bismol, and get a good night's sleep."
"I suppose so."
"You want one of us to drive you?" I asked.
"I'll be all right."
I collected Georgiana's purse from the den, and Mary Alice and I followed her to the front door. "I taught one of your employees," I told her. "Cassie Murphy. I saw her yesterday at the Samford Library. Today, too."
"She's a wonderful genealogist. I'm lucky to have her." Georgiana rubbed her palm against her forehead. "She's had to do double duty the last few days with me first out of town, and then not feeling well. And my other help, Heidi Williams, had to leave suddenly. Family emergency. It's times like this I would have called on Meg." Tears welled in Georgiana's eyes.
"You'll feel better tomorrow," I said. "Get a good night's sleep."
"I know. Thank-you." Georgiana started down the walk.
"And if the Pepto-Bismol doesn't work, try Eme-trol," Sister called.
Georgiana gave us a backward wave.
"You think she'll be all right?" I said, worried.
"Of course."
But Georgiana's path toward her car wasn't straight enough to suit me. "I'm driving her," I said. "You follow us." I called Georgiana's name and ran after her.
It wasn't far to her apartment, but I was glad I had decided to drive her. She sat on the front seat shivering, and I asked again if she wanted to go to a doctor.
"No," she insisted. "It's just a twenty-four-hour bug. Plus, I should have had more sense than to drink bourbon on an upset stomach."
"I shouldn't have given it to you." Guilt. Guilt.
Georgiana lived in a new development near the University of Alabama, Birmingham of charming attached town houses with businesses located on the first floor and the owner's apartment above each business. An old idea that is so practical, it had to make a comeback.
"I've been admiring these apartments," I exclaimed.
"It's wonderful. I walk downstairs and I'm at work. I'm close to the UAB library, and can hop on the Twentieth-Street trolley to get to the downtown library." She directed me to the wide alley where each town house had parking spaces. Mary Alice pulled in behind us.
"I can't thank you enough," Georgiana said.
"You're very welcome." I handed her the keys. "I'll check on you later."
"I think she ought to go to the doctor," I told Mary Alice as I climbed into her car.
"You want me to help you hog-tie her and drag her up to the UAB emergency room?"
"Shut up. I like these apartments, don't you? Above the businesses?"
Mary Alice nodded. "Real nice."
"I've been thinking I might like to start a small business."
"Doing what?"
"I don't know. Maybe a tutoring service, some editing. I don't know. I'm still sort of lost after working for thirty years."
"You need to do more volunteer work, take classes."
"I suppose."
We were both quiet going back over the mountain by Vulcan. I thought about Haley and Philip Nachman and wondered what they had found on the computer disks. I thought about Debbie and Henry and their fairy-tale wedding. I thought about Pukey Lukey, that I needed to drop him a note just to say it was good to see him. After all, family was family.
"How are the twins doing?" I asked Sister. "Missing Debbie?"
"They're fine. I've been doing the good grand-mama thing, going over every day and spending time with them. Giving Richardena a break. Today Fay hit May with one of those Buzzy Bee pull-toy things and knocked a knot on her head. She had to 'time-out.' Soon as she came out, May hit her back. Anyway, they ended up identical again."
"Did you explain to them that sisters don't fight?"
"I certainly did." Mary Alice actually said this seriously.
We turned onto my street, where the yards were white with dogwood.
"You know what I've been thinking?" Sister asked.
"What?" I admired the peaceful scene, the early spring twilight.
I think it really was Meg's voice on that phone."
I didn't say anything. Sometimes, if I'm quiet, the words Sister has tossed into the air vanish into the vapors.
This, however, was not to be one of those times.
"Did you hear me, Mouse?"
"I'm afraid I did."
Mary Alice pulled into my driveway and stopped. "So, what do you think?"
"I think you've lost your mind. You've been insisting all afternoon that someone was playing a prank."
"Well, I didn't want to upset Georgiana. Besides, I've been thinking." Mary Alice opened her door. "Come on. Let's go get the chicken salad. I've got a museum board meeting at eight."
I followed her, just as I had been doing for sixty years, saying, "Wait a minute. What are you talking about?"
We walked into the kitchen. Sister slung her heavy purse on one chair, pulled another out, and sat down.
"I'll tell you what I've been thinking while you fix supper."
"Okay. I want to hear this."
"Meg Bryan is still alive."
I rinsed my hands and wiped them on a paper towel. "Then who died at the courthouse?"
' 'A homeless woman. Someone the murderer knew nobody would be looking for."
"Un huh." I reached into the refrigerator for the chicken and celery. "And how come
the judge identified her, then?"
"She fell ten floors, didn't she?"
"With Meg's purse and clothes?"
"The homeless woman had stolen them from her."
"And the murderer just happened to come along while this was happening. This purse and clothes-snatching."
"Yes, and kidnapped Meg."
I chopped up celery. "Why?"
"To steal Meg's genealogy program, which he will sell for a mint to Bill Gacy at Microsoft."
"Gates, sister. Bill Gates. Gacy was the mass-murderer."
"Gates. The young, nice one who was so nice to his mother. For heaven sakes, Patricia Anne, you knew who I meant."
I added the mayonnaise with a sprinkle of Italian seasoning mix. "Where did the murderer take her?"
"You know those caves in the hill under Vulcan? The police have them blocked off to keep people like teenagers and drug dealers out, but from what I saw on TV, they'd still be easy to get into. That's a perfect place to hide someone, and I'll bet that's where he took her."
"There are telephones in the caves?"
Mary Alice thought for a moment. ' 'The kidnapper had one of those tiny cellular phones in his pocket, and Meg got it. He went to sleep and she sneaked over and got it."
"You're good, you know that?"
Mary Alice beamed.
I put the chicken salad on the table. "And you've signed up for the fiction writing class at UAB, haven't you?"
"Did Debbie tell you?"
"She didn't have to." I got each of us a plate and fork and put a package of crackers between us.
"You know," I said, pulling out a chair and sitting down. "You've got one big problem with this story.
if she tells where the program is, she's dead. If she doesn't, she's dead."
Mary Alice helped herself to a big spoonful of salad. "Well," she said, "you can't win them all."
The phone rang before I had taken a bite. It was Haley saying she had printed all of the Word Perfect files, that they were just letters, but Philip hadn't had a chance to work on the genealogy program.
"Did you see anything interesting?" I asked.
"Lord, no. Just letters to genealogy societies." Haley paused. "The one on top here is to the Southern Historical Press, ordering a catalog. The next one is to some organization she's joining called Heritage Quest. That kind of stuff. You want me to bring them over? Philip and I are going to a movie, and I can drop them off."
"Sure. What are you going to see?"
"Don't know." A giggle.
"My child is besotted by love," I told Mary Alice when I hung up.
"Well, if you're going to be besotted, that's the best thing to be besotted by."
"I guess so." I sat down, took my first bite of chicken salad, and chewed thoughtfully. "She'll be all right, won't she? With Philip? Losing Tom nearly killed her."
"She'll be fine." Mary Alice reached over and got another helping of salad. ' 'My Philip was the kindest, gentlest man in the world. Even when we were making love, he'd say, 'Be gentle, Mary Alice. Be gentle.' I'm sure Philip the Second is the same kind of man."
"Thank-you for sharing that," I said.
"You're welcome."
Water off a duck's back.
"They're boring," Haley said, handing me a large manila envelope. ' 'I just glanced through them and. nearly fell asleep."
"Thanks. Did you find out what movie you're going to?"
"We decided to rent one. Philip's got this thing for old movies."
Understandable. He was familiar with them. But all I said was, "Y'all have a good time."
I took the envelope into the den, and settled down on the sofa for a good read. The first letter, dated the previous October, was an order for Volume 9 of Irish Church Records. Okay, I thought, moving on to the second, which was dated the same day and requested information concerning a Christmas research tour in Salt Lake City at the Genealogical Society Library. The next request was for a list of unreadable tombstones in Coweta County, Georgia, which I found puzzling. If they couldn't read them, how could they list them? Some kind of scam Meg might have been investigating? I put that letter to the side and continued.
There was a letter to a woman in Ohio concerning an ancestor buried in the cemetery at Point Clear, Alabama, and a letter questioning the spelling of a German name. My eyes got heavier and heavier.
The telephone's ring woke me up. I glanced at my watch. It was nine o'clock, so it must be Fred.
But it wasn't. "Patricia Anne?" Trinity Bucka-lew's unmistakable voice.
"Hello, Trinity."
"Patricia Anne, Georgiana Peach is very ill. She may be dying."
"What?" I was still half asleep. "Georgiana? She was here this afternoon. We took her home."
"She's very ill. She may be dying," Trinity repeated, giving me a chance to wake up.
"What makes you think that? And where are you?"
"I'm in Fairhope and I called Georgiana a while ago to tell her about the plans for the fond farewell party for Meg, and she said, 'Trinity, I can't talk. I'm so sick I think I'm dying.' And I said to call 911 and she said she already had."
I was totally awake by now. "She called 911? Is there somebody I should get in touch with?"
"She has a sister, but I tried her number and she doesn't answer. I hope she's with her."
"I'll find out what's going on and call you back. Okay?" I wrote Trinity's number on the corner of the letter I had been reading when I'd gone to sleep.
Damn. I tried to think what to do. Chances were that, living where she did, if she needed emergency care they would take her to University Hospital. I looked up the number, dialed it, and asked if they had a Georgiana Peach there. To my astonishment, the woman who had answered the phone hung up on me. By the time I had dialed again, I had figured out the problem.
"There is a lady," I said, "whose name is Georgiana Peach. She called 911 and may be on the way to your emergency room. Is there any way you have to check?"
"Not until they get here. Her name's Georgiana Peach?"
"That's right. Georgiana Peach."
"How about that."
"I'll call later," I said.
There was an outside chance that the paramedics were still at Georgiana's house or that she hadn't been
sick enough to take to the hospital. I found her number and called it. A couple of rings, a click, and a different-sounding ring. "You have reached The Family Tree," Georgiana's voice. "We are unable to answer now, but if you will leave a message, we'll be happy to get back in touch with you as soon as possible."
"Damn machines," I muttered.
"What's the matter?" Fred was standing in the kitchen door, tired but exhilarated-looking.
"I hate answering machines."
Fred sank down into his recliner. "We made our expenses for a whole month in two hours tonight."
"That's great. Did you have time to eat?"
"Turkey, like you said."
"You want anything else?"
"Maybe. After I wind down." He pointed to the phone. "Who are you trying to call?"
I explained about Trinity's call and Georgiana's illness. "I'm sure they'll take her to University Hospital, but she's not there yet. Trinity says there's a sister, but she doesn't answer her phone."
"Probably with Georgiana, then." Fred got up and stretched. "I'm going to get a shower." He started down the hall and then stuck his head back through the door. "Don't worry about this lady, honey. She'll be fine."
A couple of good days at work and he has the answer for everything.
I waited a few minutes and called the emergency room at UAB again. This time the woman said that Ms. Peach had just been brought in.
"Is anybody with her? Her sister?"
"Just a minute." Turning from the phone. "Delilah! Anybody with Ms. Peach?"
I couldn't hear Delilah's answer but it must have been, "Who?"
"Ms. Peach! The lady they just brought in!" Back to the phone. "No. Not yet."
&nb
sp; "Thanks." Georgiana's voice saying "The Family Tree" on the answering machine had given me an idea. I got my purse and found the card Castine Murphy had given me the day before. Her home phone number was on it. Working with Georgiana, she would know about the sister or anybody else who needed to be contacted.
I lucked out. No machine. Just Cassie's clear voice saying, "Hello."
"Cassie," I said, "this is Patricia Anne Hollowell. Have you talked to Georgiana in the last hour or so?''
"I talked to her this afternoon, Mrs. Hollowell. Why? Is something wrong?"
"She's down at UAB hospital in the emergency room. Trinity Buckalew called her and she said she was so sick she had called 911."
"Georgiana's so sick she called 911?"
"And they took her to UAB. That's all I know, except nobody's with her. Do you know someone we should call?"
"Lord, I can't believe this. Wait a minute, let me think."
"Trinity said she had a sister."
"She does. Her name is Martha Matthews. But she lives all the way up on Lake Logan Martin." Cassie was quiet for a moment. "She's got some friends from her old neighborhood that she's still close to, but I can't think of any names." Another silence. "Do they think she's having a heart attack?"
"I have no idea."
"Well, she shouldn't be down there by herself. I'll
run down and see what's going on. Okay?"
"That's wonderful. Will you call me?"
"Soon as I find out anything."
Fred came into the den as I was hanging up the phone. He was wearing his navy silk pajamas that he dearly loves, and his hair was wet and slicked back. The pajamas had been a Christmas gift a couple of years ago along with some satin sheets. It seemed like a good idea at the time, very sexy, guaranteed to light the old fires. Not so. Fred slipped into bed and kept slipping right out the other side. The satin sheets ended up at the back of the linen closet.
"You still on the phone?" he asked.
I explained about Cassie Murphy, that she worked with Georgiana and was going to go see about her. "One of my old students," I added.
"Sometimes I think everybody in Birmingham is an old student of yours."
"Are you being grouchy? A hundred and forty students a year for thirty years. That's a lot of kids."
"I'm sorry. Did I sound grouchy? I'm just tired."
"Get yourself a glass of milk." Four thousand, two hundred kids. Most of whom I cared for. Most of whom had turned out fine.
