Texas Born

by Gould, Judith

  'It isn't, Jenny.'

  'First of all, let's get one thing straight. I'm not Jenny to you, despite the unfortunate fact that we grew up together in the same house. I'm Mrs. Tex Sexton.'

  Elizabeth-Anne tightened her lips. 'So be it, Mrs. Tex Sexton.'

  'That's better.' Jenny's eyes flashed with satisfaction. 'Now, Mrs. Zaccheus Hale,' she said magnanimously. 'What favors have you come to petition me about?'

  'I'm not petitioning you. I've come to discuss a business problem. These, in particular.' Elizabeth-Anne produced the sheaf of invoices from her purse and held them out, but Jenny refused to take them. 'You're not delivering according to orders, and you're constantly raising prices on me.'

  'If you don't like it, take your business elsewhere.'

  Elizabeth-Anne laughed bitterly. 'There isn't an elsewhere, and you know it. You Sextons have bankrupted all the competition.'

  'Business is business. It's not my fault if you go overboard and buy what you can't afford. Perhaps you should take a simple course in economics.'

  Elizabeth-Anne was silent.

  'If I were you, Mrs. Hale, do you know what I would do?'

  'Tell me, please,' Elizabeth-Anne said with a sigh. 'I have the feeling you will anyway, whether I wish to know or not.'

  'If I were you,' Jenny said slowly, 'I would be content with what I have. I wouldn't become so . . . ah . . . visible. I would stop what I was doing, cut my losses, and be content with the way things are.'

  Elizabeth-Anne frowned. 'I don't think I understand.'

  Jenny's eyes flashed. 'It's simple, really. What I'm trying to tell you is . . . don't get too big for your breeches. Don't get too ambitious. This isn't the time or the place.'

  Elizabeth-Anne bristled suddenly. 'Are you threatening me?' she asked coldly. She stared at Jenny, her gaze level.

  'Good heavens, no!' Jenny laughed artlessly. 'I just want to make sure you don't make a mistake, is all. It's so easy to get into a financial jam when you set your sights too high. Why, even I have to be careful!'

  'You?' Elizabeth-Anne laughed shortly.

  'Oh, yes, indeed,' Jenny said smugly. 'You see, I've just begun a new business. I registered it at the courthouse only yesterday afternoon. Judge Hawk was so helpful. Jennifer S. Mineral Excavations, Inc., is what I'm calling it. Tex thinks I'm biting off more than I can chew, but I don't think so. My feeling is that you can never be too diversified.' She smiled. 'But enough about me. It's you I'm worried about. You see, the trick is that you've got to be able to afford what you're doing.'

  Elizabeth-Anne wondered why Jenny was telling her all this. 'All I can do is wish you good luck,' she said stiffly, 'though I hardly think you'll need it. I'm sure you'll succeed.'

  Jenny's face held a sphinxlike expression. 'You are my luck, so why shouldn't I succeed?' she asked, suddenly speaking in riddles.

  Elizabeth-Anne looked at her quizzically. Obviously it was high time she steered the conversation back on course. 'About these bills, Mrs. Sexton.'

  'Mrs. Tex Sexton.'

  'Mrs. . . .' Elizabeth-Anne sighed heavily. '. . . Tex Sexton.'

  'Those bills are correct. I checked them out myself the day before yesterday.' Jenny took off her hat and twirled it on her index finger, watching the emeralds and diamonds flash as they spun around, a glittering whirling dervish. She kept the hat balanced so proficiently that it was obvious she had practiced that little act to perfection.

  Elizabeth-Anne folded the invoices. 'I suppose,' she said, 'it's meaningless to say that if they're not corrected, I may find it necessary to take you to court?'

  'You'd be wasting your time and money. Judge Hawk has been in our pockets for years now.'

  Elizabeth-Anne let out a deep breath. 'You wouldn't, by any chance, be trying to drive me out of business, would you?' She eyed Jenny narrowly.

  'Who? Me?' The twirling hat came to a rest; Jenny's look of surprised innocence was patently faked.

  'I can't think of anybody else who would try such underhanded dealings. Can you?'

  'Watch yourself,' Jenny growled in a low warning voice. 'If I want, I can squash you as easily as a bug, anytime I please.' Her pert nose wrinkled disdainfully. 'I don't need to be insulted by you, you goddamn freak.'

  'I'm sorry to have to say this, Jennifer, 'Elizabeth-Anne said with pointed iciness, 'but Auntie was right.'

  'Oh? In what way?'

  'She confided in me once that she was afraid you were not quite right, if you know what I mean. You harbor grudges and slights which should long have been forgotten. And both Auntie and I knew full and well why you married your husband.'

  'And pray tell, why?'

  'To get back at us,' Elizabeth-Anne said with unruffled calm. 'At Auntie. At Zaccheus. And me. You don't love Tex. You never have. You're in love with his money and his power. I wonder if he knows that.'

  Elizabeth-Anne paused. 'How does it feel to sell oneself?'

  'Get out of here!' Jenny's voice was a low, rasping whisper. 'Get out of here and never darken my door again! Do you hear me?'

  Elizabeth-Anne shrugged wordlessly.

  'Well?' Jenny shrieked with ear-piercing shrillness. 'Do I have to throw you out?'

  Slowly Elizabeth-Anne walked to the door, her head held high. She grasped the wrought-iron handle and pulled it open. For a moment she turned around and stared at Jenny.

  Jenny's eyes were fiery with murderous hatred and her breasts were heaving.

  'You may have won Tex,' Elizabeth-Anne said quietly, 'but you did not get Zaccheus. Nor will you always get what you want, no matter how hard you try. And I can promise you one thing. What you will get, Jennifer Sue Sexton, is everything your black heart deserves!'

  Jenny let out a shriek, looked around madly with glazing eyes, and lunged at a Remington bronze. She grasped the sculpture in both hands and lifted it high.

  Elizabeth-Anne shut the door just as Jenny flung it. The sculpture crashed heavily against it, splintering one of the oak panels.

  Even on her way down the hall, Jenny's tirade followed Elizabeth-Anne. 'Those prices were nothing! Nothing compared with what you're going to pay, you bitch! I'll raise them five hundred percent! A thousand! And that tourist court of yours? It'll rot, you freak! You wait and see! You'll never open the doors to that goddamn precious tourist court you and that bastard Zaccheus conceived! I'll see to it if it's the last thing I do!'

  It doesn't matter, Elizabeth-Anne told herself over and over as she drove off swiftly. Even if Jenny raised Coyote's prices astronomically, she could still make do . . . she would have to make do. She would order only what she needed. From outside, the tourist court would look complete, but she would finish only half the units on the inside, if it came to that. That would cover the usurious prices until money started to roll in from the finished units. And she could even go one better. She could buy everything else she needed in Brownsville and have it transported up here if she had to.

  There was more than one way to skin a mean cat.

  But as much as she tried to calm herself, the adrenaline raced madly through her. Her heart was palpitating and her hands were shaking violently. She knew that Jenny's threat was not an idle one. And Sexton threats were not to be taken lightly. When Jenny had screamed that the tourist court would never open . . .

  Elizabeth-Anne shivered suddenly, despite the heat. A deep fear gnawed in the pit of her stomach. Don't you think about it! She told herself over and over. It'll be all right. Everything will turn out all right.

  She tightened her lips resolutely. She would not allow herself to be frightened. Not by Jenny. Nor by Tex. Not by anybody. She would show them! She would make herself an example and show everybody who ever cowered before the Sextons just how savagely one could fight back. She would not allow herself to be intimidated or defeated: she would fight tooth and nail. She would be a worthy opponent.

  She would win.

  She tightened her lips even more resolutely. If Jenny thought she could take the tourist cou
rt away from her, well, she had a major surprise coming.

  7

  But Elizabeth-Anne was the one in for a surprise. When she got back from the ranch, a visitor wearing expensively tailored city clothes and driving a brand-new blue Chrysler was waiting for her at the café.

  'Miss Elizabeth-Anne Gross?' he asked.

  She stared at him. He was a big man, heavyset and florid-faced. 'I . . . er . . . I'm Elizabeth-Anne Hale now,' she said. 'I haven't gone by the name Gross in . . . oh, well over thirteen years.'

  'If we could, er, talk in private, ma'am?'

  Her first panicked thought was: Zaccheus! They've caught Zaccheus!

  'Are you . . . a . . . policeman?' she asked shakily-

  'Good Lord, no.' The man chuckled. 'Godfrey Greenley at your service, ma'am.' He produced a calling card and handed it to her formally. 'As you can see, I'm an attorney in Brownsville.'

  She looked at the engraved card. 'Then this isn't about Zaccheus?' Her relief was immense.

  He frowned. 'Er . . . can't say that it is, ma'am. This concerns an . . . ahem . . . an inheritance.'

  Godfrey Greenley coughed, ahem-ed, and er-ed a lot. His conversation was filled with whereases, whereuntos, and insofarases.

  Elizabeth-Anne had taken him upstairs to the second-floor parlor, and Rosa had brought up a pot of coffee.

  Greenley sipped his and set it carefully down. He cleared his throat, rose to his feet, and paced around importantly, tucking his thumbs under the lapels of his waistcoated suit.

  Elizabeth-Anne sat on the settee, feeling the baby inside her kicking as she watched him.

  'I drove up in person to . . . er . . . investigate to my satisfaction that you, Miss Gross . . . er . . . Mrs. Hale . . . are indeed the person I am looking for. Insofar as I have asked around, I am satisfied that you are.'

  She looked up at him, her hands folded in her lap. 'You said this involves an inheritance?'

  He nodded gravely. 'I did.'

  'Then there must be some mistake.' She laughed softy. 'You see, Mr. Greenley, there is nobody I could conceivably inherit from!'

  'You were once known as Elizabeth-Anne Gross?'

  'Yes, but there-'

  'And your parents did die in a circus fire back in 1901?'

  'Why, yes. But I don't see—'

  He stopped pacing and smiled; his teeth were large and tobacco-browned. 'You're her, all right. Permit me to say, Mrs. Hale, as a rule heiresses don't usually try to tell me they're not entitled to what is rightfully theirs.' He chuckled. 'If anything, once there's the smell of money, heirs, both real and fraudulent, tend to come out of the woodwork!'

  'But what . . .'

  'It's all right here.' He took an envelope out of his breast pocket. 'Whereas I could explain it to you, this letter should clear up the . . . ah . . . mystery even quicker.' 'Yes, well, but who's it from?' He passed it over to her. She looked at it. Elizabeth-Anne Gross, a labored script read. She turned it over. It was sealed. She looked at him.

  'Open it,' he said gently, producing a well-aged briar pipe and leather tobacco pouch, 'it's yours. Mind if I smoke?'

  'No, no, go right ahead.' For a moment Elizabeth-Anne just held the envelope and stared at it. Godfrey Greenley busied himself pushing the shredded tobacco down into the pipe and eyed Elizabeth-Anne while he lit it. He frowned as he puffed. He couldn't imagine anyone not tearing into that envelope. In his long experience, the smell of money usually provoked wild reactions in people.

  Sighing, she slowly tore the envelope open. The sheet of paper inside was thin and yellowed. She unfolded it. The writing was simple and straightforward and filled with spelling errors.

  Dear Elizabeth-Anne Gross:

  By the time you read this, I'll be dead and buried. You probably dont remember me or my late husband, Bazzel Grubb. I'm not too proud of what we done, try in' to pass ourselves off as your relatives all them years ago. We ain't related to you, and we got paid a tidy sum by Miz Clowney so we'd leave you with her. That woman sure did love you, I could tell. Well, Bazzel and me moved on and invested that money and it's grown to a nice little nest egg. We lived quite comforrably and then Bazzel he up and died. Everything's mine now, and since I don't have no next of kin, I want you to have it. I know this is a surprise and all, but you was such a cute kid and I felt bad about our charging Miz Clowney to let her keep you.

  God bless,

  Amanda Grubb

  Elizabeth-Anne's eyes were moist with tears. 'Auntie had to give them money!' she said softly. 'She never told me!' Godfrey Greenley cleared his throat. She looked up at him and sniffed. 'The woman who made out the will wrote that letter quite some years back,' he said. 'Does it explain everything?'

  Elizabeth-Anne wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and nodded. 'Yes.' Then she cleared her throat and said, louder, 'Yes, Mr. Greenley, it does.' She smiled sadly.

  'Good. Then I'll just read you the will and drive back down to Brownsville and execute it.'

  Elizabeth-Anne nodded absently. How strange things had turned out! she thought. Money from heaven, that's what it was. And never had she needed it more.

  So fate could dish out just as many good surprises as bad ones.

  She raised her head. 'Mr. Greenley! I was wondering if I could impose on you?' 'Ma'am?'

  'Could I ride back to Brownsville with you? There's some . . . personal business there I'd like to take care of.'

  'Of course. I'd be . . . er . . . delighted. If there's anything else you need . . .' He smiled magnanimously.

  'Just the name of a good building-supply company, that's all.'

  'Consider it done. I'll take you there myself.'

  And that was how the Hale Tourist Court was finished on time—and without any more of Coyote Building Suppliers' materials. Thanks to Amanda Grubb, Elizabeth-Anne could now afford to bypass the Sextons and have everything transported from Brownsville—on the new highway. She liked to imagine that Jenny was angry as all hell. And she thought: Well, let her be. And couldn't help adding: Maybe she's so mad she'll burst.

  8

  It was the grand opening of the Hale Tourist Court— and a week before Elizabeth-Anne's baby was due.

  As if to cooperate fully, the weather was crisp, bright, and blue. There wasn't a cloud to be seen.

  On the podium, the singer wearing the black mantilla set high on the tortoiseshell comb was finishing the last drawn-out notes of 'La Paloma.' The Mexicans hollered, clapped, and whistled, and even Quebeck's Anglos cheered and applauded enthusiastically.

  The singer made a gracious sweeping bow, exchanged bows with the guitarist, blushed, and hurried down the steps, to be swallowed up by a crowd of admirers. The six-man brass band sitting on the porch of the manager's cabin started up again and broke into a brassy John Philip Sousa march.

  The festivities had been planned as a mixture of Anglo and Hispanic traditions. Elizabeth-Anne set great store by all men being created equal.

  Everyone wore his Sunday finery, and even the completed Hale Tourist Court was dressed up for the occasion. Bright red-white-and-blue bunting was draped from the little front porches of the individual cabins, and flags snapped in the breeze. In the distance, a big rectangular billboard with a gold coronet jutting out over the top had just been unveiled. It faced the highway. 'HALE TOURIST COURT,' the bright red block letters read, and under that, large black script letters announced: 'Luxury Fit for a King—At Commoners' Prices.'

  Elizabeth-Anne, dressed in a loose, brightly flowered cotton maternity dress, gazed around with a mixture of proprietary pride and aching bone-weariness. For the first time in months she seemed relaxed. Her eyes sparkled and she looked radiant.

  At last—at long, long last, she thought—if is finished. And it will be a success. I can feel that in my bones as surely as I can tell that this fiesta, celebrating its grand opening, is a huge success.

  Nothing succeeds like success.

  She glanced toward the individual units stretching out from either side of
the central manager's cabin. A long red ribbon stretched from the farthest unit on the extreme left all the way to the farthest one on the extreme right. Behind her, on the asphalt driveway which curved in from the blue-black twin lanes of the new highway, long trestle tables had been set up and were draped with white cloths. On them, platters were piled high with local delicacies. Beer and wine flowed freely for the adults, and for the young ones there were sweetened fruit juices and pinwheels and balloons. She smiled, watching children shriek and squeal as they dashed around holding aloft their twirling pinwheels, while the adults roamed between clusters of friends and neighbors. She was gratified to note that most of Quebeck and Mexican Town had turned out for the occasion. The only people who were conspicuous by their absence were the Sextons, and she was gratified to see that too. Now that she had succeeded despite Jenny's attempts at sabotage, she was certain that Jenny was out at the ranch, seething. Which was just as well.

  'Hold it, Mrs. Hale!' a voice called from beside her.

  She turned. Hugh McElwee from the Quebeck Weekly Gazette set down his tripod, ducked under the black cloth which draped the camera, and held up the flash. After it popped and a shower of sparks rained down to the ground, he ducked back out. 'Thank you, Mrs. Hale. And congratulations.'

  'Thank you, Mr. McElwee,' she said, and joined the reverend, who was standing off to one side having an earnest conversation with the young Catholic priest from Mexican Town.

  'This is one of our town's finest hours,' the priest told her warmly. 'You've done more to lift the morale of Mexican Town than anyone, Mrs. Hale.'

  Elizabeth-Anne smiled. 'What can I say, Father? My workers were good workers. Without them, I hate to think where I would be.'

  And she thought: I know where I would be. I would have failed. The Sextons would have triumphed again. Thank God I had the sense to use the Mexican laborers instead of the Sexton construction firm's.

  The Sousa march came to a crescendo and Mayor Pitcock leapt up onto the podium clutching the sheet of paper on which he had written his speech. He held up his hands to silence the crowd.