The Ladies Farm

by Viqui Litman

  “In a way,” she said slowly, “this is what we wanted. She’ll die and we’ll get the Ladies Farm.”

  “After we nurse her through to her death. She doesn’t even look sick.”

  “She is, though,” Della said. “She’s been hiding a lot. Medication. Weakness. That’s why she takes those naps. We thought she was just lazy.”

  “I’m not going to feel sorry for her.” Kat vowed. “I’m not.”

  “No one’s asking you to feel sorry for her. And no one’s asking you to take care of her.”

  “No? That’s exactly what she’s asking. She’ll need constant care and we, all of us, will be nursing her.” Kat ran her fingers through her hair, tugging on it a little as she reached the ends. “Why can’t she go to a hospice?”

  “You heard her: She wants to die at home. Our home.”

  “You sound like you want her here.”

  Della sighed and shook her head. “I don’t know. I thought I didn’t, but then … I don’t know.”

  “It’s just because she’s dying and you don’t want to be callous.”

  “No.” Della shook her head. “It was before that.” She looked at Kat. “She’s not the way … not who I thought she was. You know what I mean?”

  The anger and doubt in Kat’s expression said no, but she did not speak.

  “You believe all these things about someone, and her appearance fits what you believe, but then, when you really get to know her … know her personally, not just as someone’s wife or mother … I don’t know, it just turns out she’s not hysterical and she’s not stupid or lazy. And all those years I thought Richard just stayed with her out of loyalty …” Watch yourself, Della warned herself, watch it, but she continued, “I don’t know.”

  “Richard was the most loyal person I ever knew,” Kat whispered.

  “I know,” Della said. “But did you ever think … did you ever think maybe he really loved her?”

  “Of course he loved her. When they were young and she was thin and they were just starting out. Of course he loved her then.” Kat looked at Della sadly.

  “Oh, Kat!” Della stepped forward and put her arms around her friend. Kat remained stiff a second, then hugged Della, resting her head on Della’s shoulder.

  “I feel stupid,” Kat whispered. “He loved her all along, didn’t he? Until the day he died.”

  Della nodded as Kat pulled away and reached for the box of tissues on her desk. “I think so. Kat,” she said gently, “all you have to do is agree to let Barbara stay. I’ll look after the rest.”

  “We don’t have much choice, do we?” Kat whispered.

  “No,” Della said. “Not really. And it’s what Pauline wanted. And Richard, I guess.”

  “How could he do this?” Kat pleaded. “How could he do this to me?”

  “I don’t know,” Della said. At least that was the truth. “I’m sure he didn’t foresee all of us here.” She would bet on that. “I think Richard just thought he’d live forever, that he’d always be there to care for his wife.” And for me, she added silently. He would have been there for me.

  “She’s kinder than I thought,” Kat conceded. “I kind of admired that business about the haircut.”

  “Yeah.” Della looked out the window as another truck rumbled by. “You okay?”

  “No. But I will be.”

  They edged into a discussion about how they would accommodate Barbara’s illness: how they would adjust to each level of Barbara’s diminishing function. Kat became more tractable as they moved into logistics; these, after all, were manageable problems.

  Della looked at her sturdy friend and tried to picture Richard holding her hand or singing old ballads while they danced in hotel rooms. It didn’t surprise her that Kat was as vulnerable as anyone else to Richard’s sentimentality. And Della knew that Richard would have loved cracking Kat’s brittle shell.

  But Kat’s fierce protection of the memory confused Della. From what Della could tell, Kat and Richard had had a sporadic affair that lasted a little over a year and ended when Kat met Grant. Richard’s just an old boyfriend to Kat, Della thought. But maybe when she compares it to her marriage, her time with Richard seems more significant.

  “Hello?” Kat was saying.

  Della blinked, stared at Kat. “Sorry. I was just …”

  “Zoning out,” Kat accused. “You do that whenever the talk turns to finances. Did you see the appraisal?”

  “No.”

  “You need to look at it. It’s a typical estate appraisal, but I don’t know if Hugh Junior will go for that.”

  “You think he’ll want more?” Della didn’t know why people shook their heads to clear their thoughts. It made her a little dizzy.

  Kat shrugged. “I was asking you. You know the kid.”

  Della shrugged back. “Not enough to know whether he just wants to free himself and his sister from the Ladies Farm or if he wants to cash in big-time.”

  “Well, if that’s what he wants,” Kat leaned back in her chair, “he’ll have to look somewhere other than these two little old ladies.”

  There was other business, and the two spent an hour catching up on bookings, receipts, and building repairs. Della hadn’t made ad calls for Silver Quest since Barbara’s arrival; she and Kat pulled a prospect list and split up the calls to help get caught up. “There’s an outfit in Michigan that does a campsite guide for seniors,” Kat said. “I saw the book in a client’s office, but now I can’t remember the name.”

  “Prime Time Press,” Della supplied. “We called them, remember? Mom and Pop, word of mouth, no ad budget?”

  Kat nodded.

  “But I’ll try again. If they’re still in business, maybe they’ve got a budget now.”

  Kat continued on about food budgets and their own advertising, which was minimal now that they had established a lot of repeat visitors. If she closed her eyes, Della could imagine that Pauline was out in the barn and that she and Kat were just taking care of business while Pauline taught journal writing.

  Della wondered what Kat would do if she knew about Richard and the real estate agent, or about Richard and Della.

  Kat’s tough, Della thought. You could probably tell her everything.

  I need Pauline, Della thought for the thousandth time. Someone to confide in.

  After she and Kat finished, Della wandered over to the salon. Rita had two women from town under facials as she combed out the third. Nodding at Della as she worked, Rita described for the women the benefits of cucumber extract on aging skin.

  “It cleanses the pores,” she said. “The cucumber juices have just the right combination of acid to really get into those pores and clean them out. Then you finish with a nice, tingly, non-drying pore closer, and you’ve got yourself a face that’s soft as butter. How’re you doing, Della?” she continued, shifting gears without stopping her combing and circling her customer. “You want me to do something special for your big date?”

  “Where is the nail polish?” Della demanded. “I just came down here to touch up my nails.”

  “Where it always is,” Rita said. “In the cart.”

  “I meant, where’s the cart?”

  Rita waved her toward a partition, behind which sat the rolling cart with the manicure supplies. Della plucked polish and top coat from the cart, then returned to a seat under one of the dryers.

  “Why don’t you at least let me style you before you go out? I’ve got a spot that afternoon,” Rita called to her from the sinks in the back.

  “I don’t want to make a big fuss over this,” Della yelled back.

  “I’ll make it look casual,” Rita called back. “No big hair, I promise.”

  After she returned to the salon and scooted her customers out the door, Rita undid her smock and tossed it over a salon chair. “You want me to finish those for you?”

  Della paused with the tiny brush raised over her right forefinger, then shook her head. “I’m almost done. Are you finished for the day?” />
  “Are you kidding? I’ve got three more heads plus a barber. But the next one’s not till four. I thought maybe I’d run over to Dave’s for a while.”

  “That’s going pretty hot and heavy.”

  “Oh, no!” Rita said. “Don’t you start that about my ex-husband when you won’t talk about yours! I confess doing it in a cemetery, and you won’t even tell me you have a dinner date. I have to hear it from Barbara!”

  Della didn’t have to look up to see the indignation. “Barbara told you?”

  “When she came down to get me.”

  Della put the cap back on the top coat and carried both nail polish bottles over to the rolling cart. “I guess her cutting her hair makes more sense now,” Della said.

  “I suppose. I sure do feel sorry for her, though. And I’m glad she’s staying here, where we can look after her. So where are you and Tony going?”

  Della smiled back. “I don’t know. Just to dinner. I wish you wouldn’t make such a fuss.”

  “It’s good for you to go out,” Rita said.

  “I know. That’s why I told him I would. But it really is just dinner.”

  “Well, that’s how Dave and I started back, you know.”

  “Dave is persistent,” Della said.

  “He says some men never love more than one woman no matter what Old Pete—that’s what we call his pecker, Old Pete—tells ’em. Don’t matter where Pete goes, guys like Dave still just are thinking about that one.”

  Della started to laugh. “Old Pete? And you believe that?”

  Rita shrugged. “Well, it’s easy when I’m the one he’s in love with. Besides,” she smoothed her spiky black cap and tossed her head to make her earrings jiggle, “Old Pete’s a little in love with me too.”

  “I’ll just bet.”

  Rita looked at her a moment. “Della, haven’t you ever done anything a little foolish just because your heart told you to?”

  “Those were my hormones, not my heart.”

  “Well, your hormones, then. Didn’t you ever just do what they said?”

  “Oh, of course! That’s what I’m telling you though: My hormones are not telling me anything about Tony.”

  “But they might,” Rita countered. “If you’d listen.”

  Chapter 11

  “Where’s Barbara?” Hugh Jr. asked as he ushered them into the conference room. The glass tabletop reflected his gesturing hands as he motioned to the carafe in the table’s center. “Help yourselves.”

  They had talked about it and had decided there was no point in telling him that they would inherit Barbara’s share of the Ladies Farm soon enough. “Barbara’s really not feeling too well,” Della said. She smiled at Hugh Jr. and reached for the coffee and a glass mug.

  “Sorry to hear that,” he said. “I thought we could settle everything right now.”

  Della concentrated on pouring the coffee without dribbling anything onto the table and let Kat answer Hugh Jr.

  “We thought … that is, we discussed it with Barbara, and she said what she told you: She’s not interested in increasing her share of the Ladies Farm.” Kat smiled at Hugh Jr. as Della passed her the carafe. “So, we’re your best prospects. Fire away.”

  Hugh Jr. smiled and took a breath. “My parents put a lot of themselves into Sydon House and then the Ladies Farm. And while I credit the two of you, plus that hair salon, for a great deal of the effort that finally made the thing a going concern, I think you’ll agree that the guiding spirit was always my mother.”

  He’s found out about the gravel, thought Della as he continued. Della eyed the stack of journals and files that Hugh Jr. had set on the table before him. She and Kat had agreed they could go as high as fifteen percent over the appraisal, though they had vowed to try to hold him to ten.

  “It was certainly her vision,” Kat concurred.

  Good move, thought Della. We’ll be in total agreement right up until the moment he names his price. She could pick out Pauline’s fabric-covered notebooks in the stack and she imagined Hugh Jr. sifting through them, noting addresses and sending dutiful notes to his parents’ old friends.

  “Yes,” Hugh Jr. resumed the narrative. “Her vision. And her planning. And her hard work. Her classes. Her décor. Her ability to get along with anyone, no matter how cruel they were to her.

  “One thing she always warned me about, her great overriding admonition, was that there’s nothing certain but certain change. And,” he placed his hands flat on the table and sat back as if pushed there by the weight of the truth he was about to deliver, “change has overtaken the Ladies Farm.”

  You can say that again, thought Della.

  “Change,” Hugh Jr. repeated. “Ladies, I’m sure you understand. As my mother’s executor, I have a responsibility to my sister … and to her children … and I hope, someday, my own.”

  As Hugh Jr. finally explained that he had talked to the Castleburgs about their gravel mining, Della exchanged glances with Kat.

  “As you can imagine,” Hugh Jr. said, “I now believe the Ladies Farm to be worth considerably more than the appraisal. Particularly this appraisal.”

  Della rushed to defend the honor of Sydonia. “I’m sure Mr. Tice was trying to err on the side of lower estate taxes.”

  “I’m sure.” He smiled, but his lips stretched thin against his teeth.

  “Hugh, we understand completely,” Kat said. “Your mother was … I can’t tell you how much she meant to us. And because of that, we want to do whatever’s right for you and Melissa. So why don’t you just tell us what you think is a fair value for your mother’s interest in the Ladies Farm.”

  “Two hundred eighty thousand dollars.”

  “Pardon me?” Della heard her own words, but she wasn’t sure who said them.

  “Two-eighty.”

  “How did you come to that?” Kat asked in a remarkably cool voice. “The appraisal valued the whole property at less than two, and there’s a hundred and thirty thousand worth of notes.”

  “I looked at the fair market value,” Hugh replied in equally cool tones. “I let Castleburg make me an offer.”

  “Castleburg? The old man?” Della squeaked.

  Hugh Jr. nodded.

  “Does he know about Barbara?”

  Hugh Jr. nodded. “That’s why I’m so sorry she’s not here. But I know you’ll speak with her. Convince her this is in her best interest, too.”

  Kat’s eyes narrowed. “Five-sixty for the whole thing? What’d you tell Castleburg? That you owned the whole thing?” She didn’t wait for his denial. “Or that you’d get it all for him.”

  “You knew my father. He was impractical. If it weren’t for my mother, he would have been hammering and sawing before they ever sketched out what the Ladies Farm looked like. She was the one who had the plans drawn, hired electricians and plumbers.”

  For how many years, Della wondered, would Hugh Jr. be blaming his father for mistreating his mother?

  “We knew these things,” Kat snapped. “We knew all your father’s shortcomings, that’s why we moved in to bail out your mother.”

  “And your mother knew them, too,” Della rushed to add. “They were just one more part of the husband she loved.”

  Hugh Jr. looked at her a second. “Just one more part,” he repeated. “In any case, it turns out that the prospects for gravel on the property are quite good, and that Dad, in his wisdom, decided to ignore those prospects in his pursuit of the good life.”

  “Don’t you think your mom joined in that decision?”

  “I’m sure she acquiesced.”

  “Where does this leave us?” Kat asked.

  Hugh Jr. regarded her sympathetically. “The arrangement you had with my mother … it amounted to a lease, with payment being the services you provided.” His hands rested for a moment on the stack of files and books, and he drummed his fingers thoughtfully. “We can continue it, of course, but you know, now, you would be tenants, running the bed and breakfast and paying part of
the proceeds to the estate … to Melissa and me.”

  “Tenants!” Della couldn’t help herself. “Tenants on the Ladies Farm!”

  But Kat had seen the whole picture. “The Ladies Farm in the middle of a gravel pit,” she said calmly. “How soon do you anticipate digging?”

  “Not so quickly that you won’t have time to close things out and find yourselves a new place.” He held his hands palms up in front of himself. “It’s not our intention to put you on the street. But we—Melissa and I—can’t afford to pass up Castleburg’s offer.”

  “Unless, of course, we meet it,” Kat said. “And assuming, of course, you have Barbara’s cooperation.”

  “I intend to talk with her as soon as I can.”

  But not before we talk with her, Della vowed. Because if Barbara won’t sell, if Barbara’s giving us her half—“You also should know,” Hugh Jr. was saying, “that Castleburg’s talked to the Huttos.”

  “The Huttos? But there’s no—”

  “No point to us arguing about it, is there?” Kat cut her off.

  “I’ll call Barbara this afternoon,” Hugh Jr. told them. “Maybe come out later this week.” He sipped cautiously. Then he smiled. “I think Barbara will go along with what we want: I think she owes us that much.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Kat.

  “Hugh—” Della started.

  Hugh Jr. pulled one of the journals off the top of the stack before him and slid it across the table. “Read all about it.”

  “Hugh,” Della said, “the Morrisons were good friends of your parents. If they hadn’t bailed them out, time after time, your parents could never have held onto Sydon House.”

  “They lent my parents money,” Hugh stated. “My parents paid back every penny.”

  “Read all about what?” Kat said.

  “Barbara and my dad.”

  “What?”

  Della shot a look at Kat, then plunged in. “Hugh, your father had a one-night stand with Barbara years and years ago. Your parents got over it. The Morrisons got over it. It didn’t mean anything then, and it doesn’t mean anything now.”

  “Barbara cheated on Richard?” The journal lay untouched on the glass table.