She hoped for better luck with Mr. Jim, gardener to the Palmer clan. When Blanche was growing up, he and his wife and two sons lived a couple of doors away. He was a little man with long arms and a flattish head that made him look apelike—something he’d learned to use to his advantage at the poker table. As a child, Blanche had developed a kindness toward him because people teased him about his looks the same way they teased her for being true black.
“I works too hard to be listenin to what them peoples is up to. Anyways, I ain’t hearin’ all that good these days,” Mr. Jim said, although he didn’t seem to have any problem hearing Blanche. She tried to reach the Palmers’ mailman, Roger Grainfield, but his wife said he was away at his uncle’s funeral.
Okay, okay, she told herself, you knew it wasn’t going to be easy. Would she have had a better chance of getting information from Miz Letitia and Mr. Jim if she’d been willing to tell them what Palmer had done to her? Maybe. Maybe outrage left over from times past, when the rape of a black woman by a white man was as common as a rainy day and just as accepted, would have loosened their tongues. Maybe not. Maybe the reality of a black community still too weak to protect its own would have kept them mute. Suddenly the feeling that she was wasting her time was stronger than hope. She lay down on her bed and pulled a thin blanket over her head, even though it was quite warm outside.
The party they were working that night was being held after the Bicentennial Awards Banquet, at the home-that-could-pass-for-a-hotel of the county’s only state judge. Everyone who ever wanted to be anyone in that part of North Carolina was going to be there, including David Palmer. Blanche knew she’d have to make herself ready to see him again, but at least this time she’d put his presence to use.
Before the guests began to arrive, Blanche had a talk with Raheem and Rasheed, who were hired to park the cars. They were short, cute, plump brothers whose color and long necks reminded her of goose-necked squash. Ardell had told her both young men also did caddying and worked on cars at a dealership out on the highway. Blanche figured that gave them a fair acquaintance with the local men of means. She’d waved a ten-dollar bill under each of their noses and told them that later she was going to want to check out cars belonging to some local people.
Earlier, she’d told Ardell what she planned to do. “Probably won’t find anything, but I feel like I gotta look everywhere I can.”
Ardell hadn’t looked happy. “Be careful, Blanche. Anybody catch you, Carolina Catering could…”
“I will,” Blanche had interrupted, annoyed at feeling momentarily in competition with the catering business for Ardell’s support.
When the party geared up, Blanche went out front to see if there were any chauffeur-driven cars. She found three balding black men ranging in color from nearly white to chocolate-brown to Blanche’s own eggplant blackness. They greeted her invitation to a snack with grins and thanks. Blanche ushered them to a small table in the kitchen, out of the way of the catering staff and already loaded with enough food to keep them chomping for a day. She turned the TV on to a baseball game as extra incentive to sit and stay, then slipped back out front.
Rasheed and Raheem walked down the drive with her, telling her which car belonged to whom. David Palmer’s big gray BMW was parked at the bottom of the drive in a row with cars belonging to Seth and Jason Morris. Archibald’s car was nearby, as was the Mayor’s brother’s car and that of the host’s sister. Blanche decided to check out a few of the cars, so the boys wouldn’t know she was interested only in Palmer’s, but she just had to check Palmer’s car first. She took her rubber gloves from her apron pocket.
“I’m not going to take anything. I just want a look-see,” she told the boys.
She made them stand near the front of the car, facing the house, so they couldn’t see what she was doing, blocked her from being seen, and could warn her if someone was coming. She opened the front passenger door of Palmer’s car.
“You looking for something special, Miz Blanche?” one of the boys asked over his shoulder.
“Not exactly. I’m just doing a little research.”
“What kind of research?” he wanted to know.
“Sort of secret research. The kind I can’t talk about, honey.”
She felt but didn’t care about his disappointment—as long as he stopped with the questions.
Palmer’s car was neither spotless nor particularly dirty. It smelled of cigars. There were tapes in the compartment between the seats—some country, some white blues. She put her head out of the door and took a deep breath. Her skin recoiled from the car seat, from the knowledge that he had touched the very spot where she sat. She gritted her teeth and went on. There was change mixed with paper clips in the depression between the seats. The pocket in the door on the driver’s side held a map and a roll of Life Savers. There was also a white handkerchief with a few dark brown stains on an inside fold. She unlocked the glove compartment with the key in the ignition: a sleek black electric razor, breath mints, a clean handkerchief, a leather-bound notebook with attached pencil, but no notes, car booklets—nothing. Blanche pushed her disappointment away. It had been a long shot, after all. She closed and locked the glove compartment and moved on, keeping up her pretense of larger interests.
Archibald’s Lexus was next. She felt a flash of the excitement she always got when searching her employers’ things. She rifled through his Vivaldi and Chopin tapes. Like Palmer’s, Archibald’s glove compartment was also locked. She took the key dangling from the ignition and unlocked it. There was a Bible and a gun inside. Blanche didn’t know which was the bigger surprise, but didn’t touch either one. She looked down at Archibald’s four keys on their plain silver ring. One was the ignition key, two others likely fit real locks, and the fourth was more of a key-looking ornament: a snake with most of its body extended and the tail loosely curled, giving it the shape of an old-fashioned door key. It held her eye for a moment before she put the keys back and moved on to the other cars.
Seth and Jason Morris’s Mercedes were exactly the same, including their dark blue color, which made her wonder which brother was the copycat. She voted for cheap-feel-copping Seth. She snatched Seth’s keys out of the ignition. He had a snake ornament like Archibald’s attached to his key chain. Jason had one, too. She turned it over with her finger. It had the markings of a snake with a wide black eye; a six-digit number was stamped onto the coiled portion of its body. She walked to the Mayor’s brother’s car. He had a snake ornament as well. She looked in the car parked behind him. There was a snake ornament on that key chain, too, although the host’s sister didn’t have one. Blanche went back to Palmer’s car and checked his key ring again. Definitely no snake key. She didn’t know what it meant, but she had that nose-twitching feeling for the second time that day.
She thanked the boys again and returned to the kitchen. The three chauffeurs were leaning back in their chairs, eyes glued to the game, stomachs seeming to bulge just an inch or two more than before she’d fed them. She waved to them and headed toward the front of the house.
The buzz of people talking mingled with music. She looked in the various rooms: the library full of men with cigars talking like they knew something; the billiard room, where mostly younger men and a few women were laughing and flirting across a pool table. There were dancers off the dining room, and Carolina Catering’s excellent buffet in what was probably the breakfast room. Laughter erupted on the terrace outside the library.
The three inseparables were standing together near the bar. Had she ever seen Palmer, Jason, and Seth Morris at one of these things when they weren’t together? Tonight they were joined by Nancy, Jason’s wife, and a thin, long-faced, very pregnant woman who stood close enough to Seth for Blanche to believe she was his wife. Blanche watched herself watching Palmer. Did this mean she was getting stronger? She thought of all the black women who’d stood as she was standing, looking at their rapist, th
e raper of their daughters, black women who’d had to smile, to continue to serve in order to eat and feed their children. She wondered what David Palmer would do if she walked across the room and told him not to leave any more threatening messages on her machine. Act like he hadn’t heard her, probably. So what? She took a step toward him, then another, before she was stopped by the reality of what getting in his face here might mean to Carolina Catering. While she watched, Jason said something to Nancy and waited for her to respond. Instead, Nancy turned her back on him and began talking to Seth’s wife, who was holding her large belly as though she thought somebody might steal it. Fury flashed across Jason’s face. Palmer put his hand on Jason’s arm and began talking. This was the second time Blanche had seen Nancy Morris, who’d been so meek and mild with her, treat her apparently polite and decent husband like he wasn’t any of that. Nancy and Seth’s wife wandered away. Palmer’s eyes never strayed from Jason. Blanche went back to the kitchen.
She was as tired as a sharecropper at sundown when she got home. The blinking light on her answering machine made her stomach clench in anticipation of what new threat might be waiting for her. She fixed herself a drink before she pushed the playback button.
First message: “Yo, Moms, whatsup?” Malik wanted to know. Damn! She’d been so freaked out by the threat that had followed Malik’s message on the answering machine on Tuesday that she’d forgotten he was calling today. There was no more to his message, so she figured he was all right. There was no way she could call him, other than through the camp office, which he’d told her to do only in the most serious emergency, so she’d just have to wait until he called again.
Second message: “Big, fine, beautiful woman, where are you when I need to talk to you? I miss you, Blanche. Really miss you. Being with you makes me feel on top of the world. Thinking about you even makes these crazy white folks I work around less of a pain in the butt. Can’t wait to see you,” Thelvin told her, complete with train-station noise in the background.
Pleasure in his message, and in the fact that there was no threatening message following it, made her laugh aloud. How many men his age could just pick up the phone and say how they felt—and into a machine, no less? How many men of any age?
“Hey, Thelvin,” she told his machine. “I’m real sorry I missed your call, but I plan to listen to your message over and over again. See you soon.” She started to add an “I hope” to that but changed her mind. Overeager was for beavers. She took a long soak in the tub and cleared her mind of everything but the sound of her own breathing and the stillness of the evening outside.
Sleep came easily, along with a dream of keys that sang and messages on her answering machine that couldn’t be heard in the usual way. She had to lay hands on the machine and feel the messages—not only the words but what the caller was thinking, feeling. When she woke, she remembered only one of the callers: Thelvin. She couldn’t remember what his message said, but it felt like a combination of good sex and good food. She was ready for all of that.
SEVENTEEN
SMOKE, FLOWERS, AND BACKUP
Blanche called Archibald first thing in the morning. His secretary said he was in a meeting. Blanche hardly had time to be disappointed and hang up the phone before someone tapped at her door.
“Hey, Miz Blanche, I was on my way to work, so I thought I’d drop by instead of calling you,” Mary from the bank told her.
Blanche offered her some breakfast, but Mary said she didn’t have much time.
“I just wanted to tell you that David Palmer’s been writing checks to a flower shop. A lot of them. Every week, it looks like.”
Blanche stood up a bit taller; the day seemed to brighten. “Flowers? From where?”
“Buckley Flowers, downtown.”
Blanche saw it in her mind: silk birds-of-paradise on a pedestal in the window, green awning. “Thanks, Mary. You’re a true sister.”
“I’m just glad I could help. A man like that…Well, I hope you can do something.”
“What church you belong to, Mary?” Blanche remembered Mary’s mentioning church when they first spoke.
“Shiloh Baptist. Why?”
“Just curious,” Blanche said. She thanked Mary again and gave her a big hug before she left.
As soon as Mary was gone, Blanche took out five of Archibald’s twenties and reached for her notepad. “This donation is made in the name of Mary Lee in thanks for her kindness.” She didn’t sign it. She folded the note and tucked the twenties inside. She’d pick up some envelopes and mail the note when she got downtown, which was where she was headed. The flower thing wasn’t much, but it made Blanche dance across the room. It was something, which was one hundred times better than nothing.
Downtown was still sleepy when she got there: shops were just beginning their morning opening routines: pavements being swept, awnings lowered, and doors unlocked. Blanche sat on a bench beneath a tree across the street from Buckley Flowers. The closed sign was still in the window. A bouquet of silk flowers stood on the pedestal in the window. She could just make out the long glass-fronted flower case inside.
A stringy, olive-skinned white woman wearing a brown linen dress and beige pumps and carrying a matching bag. She stopped in front of the flower shop, fumbled in her purse for a set of keys, opened the front door, and flipped the sign in the plate-glass window to open. The shoe store next door was also open now, but the tea room on the other side was still closed.
A short, fiftyish brown-skinned woman came out of the flower shop. Blanche sat up a little straighter She figured this woman must have gone in by the back door. She wore a yellow smock over a print dress and carried a broom. Blanche looked closely at her face but found nothing familiar. She watched the woman sweep the pavement with care, then rose to leave. She’d seen who was working there, which was all she’d come for. She’d stop by Miz Minnie’s again on the way home.
“Flower shop, flower shop…Now, let me think.” Miz Minnie tilted her head back and aimed her rheumy eyes at the ceiling, as though her list of acquaintances were written up there. The longer she was silent, the harder she rocked her chair. Finally, she sighed and slowed her rocking before she came to a full stop, like a pilot bringing in a plane.
She turned to Blanche. “Chile, I didn’t even know a colored person was working in that there flower shop. Never thought I’d live to see the day in this town when a black woman would be waiting on customers in a downtown Farleigh flower shop.” Miz Minnie sounded as though she were announcing the death of a loved one. Blanche realized that, in a way, she was. The changes in Farleigh were all over the place, more housing developments going up, more shops downtown, more cars, even a new motel out on the highway. But she hadn’t realized until now how much that change had affected black Farleigh: there were blacks in and around this town whose people, jobs, children, and problems Miz Minnie didn’t know. The two women sat observing a moment of silence for a way of life that was now deceased.
Blanche went home and called Ardell.
“Oh yeah, Aurelia. She moved here from Greenville. Went to school for flower-arranging or some such thing that don’t sound like much of a living. Something happened in Greenville. Something about a married man, I think. Anyway, I remember hearing she got herself a job in the flower shop. ’Course, she just the type a Negro they would hire. She’s one of the reasons I don’t use them for flower arrangements. She act like every dime and flower is hers.”
Blanche remembered Aurelia sweeping the pavement in front of the flower shop. Some things might have changed, but lots of things hadn’t—at least not much.
“Thanks, Ardell. I’m gonna run by Mama’s. I’ll be back in about an hour.”
First Blanche made some tea and thought about how to approach flower-shop Aurelia. Given what Ardell had said, it’d be a waste of time either trying to appeal to Aurelia as she’d done to Mary or offering her money. She finished her tea
and left the house.
She tapped on her mother’s screen door. “Mama? It’s me. You home?” No answer. Blanche walked through the house. It smelled of lemon-scented furniture polish and bacon. She looked out the back screen door into the small yard lined with petunias. Her mother was hanging a tea towel on the clothesline. Her almost all-white hair glistened like snow in sunlight. She leaned over to pick up the clothespin bag. Then, one hand on her back, the other on her thigh, she slowly straightened up. Very slowly. Blanche’s heart did a double beat. “Sweet Ancestors,” she whispered, then stopped, unsure what to say to appeal for her mother’s continued life without sounding selfish or asking the impossible. She stepped back, and her mother opened the screen door.
“Well, now.” Miz Cora gave Blanche a rare smile. “It sure is a pretty day, ain’t it?”
For that reason, Ancestors, Blanche thought. Just so she can keep seeing beautiful days. “Sure is, Mama, it sure is.”
Miz Cora went to the sink and washed and dried her hands. She looked at Blanche over her shoulder. “You want somethin’ to eat? I got some fresh biscuits and some of that slab bacon you like sitting right there on the stove, and I just opened a new jar of apple jam this morning.”
“Sure sounds good, but maybe I oughta move them boxes first.” Blanche went upstairs to the small back bedroom that had once contained her life. Flashes of her child- and girlhood raced across her mind at the sight of that old dresser with her initials carved in the back, the wrought-iron bedstead that had always cooled her wrists on the hottest of nights. Her cane-bottomed rocker, picked up as a throwaway in front of some better-off person’s house. None of the memories made her wish to be back then. She hadn’t much liked being a child; she’d never enjoyed being under anyone’s control. She opened the three boxes she’d left with her mother when she’d moved to Boston. There was nothing in them of value to anyone but her: a very dog-eared copy of Langston Hughes’ poetry—the book that made her realize there were people like her to be read about; a flower press she’d made at church camp; her old skates. All things that she could easily live without now but that had helped save her life when she was a girl looking for a place to hide inside herself from the taunts about her blackness and from her mother’s constant reminders to stay out of trees and fights. Now she carried the boxes downstairs and stored them on the little closed-in back porch so they’d be out of Sauda’s way. Before she left her old room, Blanche couldn’t help noticing the new blue-and-green floral curtains her mother had made for Sauda’s arrival. Her own summer quilt, left to her by her grandmother, was folded at the foot of the bed. She’d only left it behind when she moved because Mama liked having it in the house. She blinked back tears as she was suddenly bushwhacked by her childhood belief that there was always someone her mother preferred over her.
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