“She keeps saying that this land use firm is only doing preliminary work in order to make recommendations for development sites,” Spring said. “But I don’t buy it.”
“Well,” Gerald intoned, “there’s ample reason to suspect what she says because it rarely matches what she does. You all do remember what happened the last time she said something was in the quote-unquote preliminary stage.”
“The Junction at Commerce Plaza,” several in the small group said with a unified groan. A moment of silence ensued as if each person needed to mourn for a moment the fiasco of that development project.
The Junction was a twenty-four-hour multibay gas and service station, convenience store and car wash that put an incredible strain on what had been a green out parcel of Commerce Plaza. The city had to, at considerable unbudgeted taxpayer expense, add two north–south turn lanes, a traffic light system and curb and gutter just to deal with the increased vehicular traffic. The site had been cleared and paved with foundation before the historical review committee could get an injunction on any of the work for, among other things, an archaeological dig of the area. A judge ultimately ruled that it would have been more detrimental to the city to undo the work or to cancel the contracts that had already been approved.
The group wanted to ensure that the mayor’s latest pet project didn’t turn into the Junction 2.0.
“What do you think of as gourmet food when you think of Poland?” Georgina Lundsford asked, apparently talking to no one in particular as she waited in line.
“What?” Cecelia asked.
“Just like the mayor and being reasonable don’t go together, neither does Poland and gourmet food.” Gerald turned to face Georgina from his position in line to order lunch. “Don’t get me wrong,” he said, taking her odd comment at face value. “There is a wonderful cuisine out of the country, but the label ‘gourmet’?” He shrugged. “I don’t think so. There are a lot of comfort foods in Polish cuisine. Lots of sausage and sauerkraut and several types of breads.”
“Looks like someone didn’t take her medication again this morning,” Cecelia whispered to Spring.
The two exchanged an amused glance. Get this group started on the topic of food, and they might never get around to the real business at hand.
“And pierogis,” Georgina said, linking her arm with Gerald’s. “Those are yummy. I wish they had some here. Maybe I’ll make some for dinner next week. What did you decide, Gerald, dear? Do you want one of these soups?”
“I’m all for comfort food,” he said. “Since the burglary at the shop, that’s all I can seem to manage.”
Georgina patted his arm. “It was such a sad day,” she said. “But the good thing is that although you and Richard had things stolen from Step Back in Time Antiques, neither of you was physically harmed. Insurance will take care of the rest.”
“Have the police arrested anyone yet?” Spring asked Gerald.
“No, but they assure us that they’re following several leads.” With another look at the menu boards, he said, “C.J. makes a pretty mean baked macaroni and cheese. I think that’s what I’ll have.”
“Really?” Georgina asked, sounding equally mystified and horrified. “Didn’t you say that’s what you had for dinner last night?”
Gerald winked at her. “That’s right. I did. You ladies drown yourselves in Häagen-Dazs when you’re upset. For me, it’s mac and cheese.”
That earned him a laugh from the group. After placing their assorted orders for sandwiches, soups and other lunch items, the Cedar Springs Historical Society members claimed several tables near the back of the dining room. Pushing them together, they made one communal table for the entire bunch. After everyone got settled with sweet tea, coffee or sparkling water, Spring got down to business.
“We have to do something,” she said, reaching back to dig into the tote bag she’d put over the back of her chair. She pulled out a small leather portfolio and plucked several pages from it. “This is the only one they had at the library. I took the liberty of making several copies.”
She handed them around to her friends.
Georgina squinted at the small writing, which was a photocopy of a photocopy. “I have trouble if there are too many things to follow,” she said. “Where are my glasses?” Gerald lifted them from her head and handed them to her. She offered him a smile in thanks. “This is from a database, right, Spring?”
“Yes,” she said. “I’ll read it back to you.”
She then provided the highlights of all the information she’d gleaned. When she finished, the entire group looked glum. The old property records just muddied the waters. While the Darling land ownership wasn’t in question and never had been, some other parcels had dubious title due to several “gentlemen’s agreements” made in the 1930s and 1940s regarding property lines.
“You know,” Georgina said. “Maybe instead of trying this tactic, we should do something else.”
“Like what?” Cecelia asked. “The only other thing I can think of is an outright intervention.”
Spring looked thoughtful for a moment, then said, “Hmm.”
“No, Spring,” Cecelia intoned.
“It could work,” Spring said. “An intervention might not be such a bad idea.”
“I was joking,” Cecelia said, casting a worried glance around the table. “It was a joke, Spring.”
The historical society’s president nodded. “But it doesn’t have to be.”
The more Spring thought about it, the more the idea appealed to her. But what she had in mind wasn’t an intervention for the mayor. Bernadette Howell’s mind would not be swayed no matter how convincing the arguments or how rational the case the Cedar Springs Historical Society made.
No, what Spring realized is that David Camden needed to see firsthand what was at stake. He needed to know and understand that it was more than her family’s desire to make things difficult, a perspective the mayor held. He needed to see that the society’s opposition was not because her family wanted to lord their wealth over everyone else, a supposition put forth by at least one pro-development resident in a letter to the editor of the Cedar Springs Gazette.
The Darlings were not opposed to progress. The family’s lasting legacy to the city of Cedar Springs was that it had the resources it needed to thrive...and it had, growing from an enclave of farming families into a bustling village and from there a thriving city that was a suburban hideaway for those who liked the proximity and amenities associated with an urban area without all the attendant crime, blight and malaise.
Spring wasn’t naive. Cedar Springs had its share of problems, the creep of crime from Raleigh and Durham to the north and up from Fayetteville to the south seemed to be growing rather than decreasing. And homelessness was an ongoing problem. But that didn’t mean that she or the historical society had to abandon hope or succumb to pressure to make Cedar Springs a cookie-cutter facsimile of every other municipality in North Carolina.
She didn’t want to drag all the historical society members into the mix. The idea she had for David needed to be confined to an intimate group. And Spring knew just which group could and would want to be a part of her little intervention. This was a plan that could be carried out by the Magnolia Supper Club. So Spring let the rest of the meeting at the Corner Café swirl on around her.
Georgina Lundsford proposed a rally in the town square outside city hall and the public administration building. Gerald suggested posters, à la “Save Cedar Springs,” that could be printed up and placed in front of store windows or on bulletin boards and staked in front yards of like-minded residents. And Millicent Graves, bless her heart, who still wore her hair long and plaited like she had during the 1960s protest movements, offered as a plan a sit-in and march to make the city’s elected officials see reason.
Spring’s phone vibrated in her pocket
. She pulled it out, expecting to see a message from the hospital or the clinic. It was instead a text message from Cecelia, who was sitting directly across from her at the table.
Does she know that it’s not 1968?
Spring bit back a smile and tapped a quick reply.
Don’t worry. I have another idea.
Cecelia lifted her brows in silent query to Spring, who shook her head ever so slightly. “Later,” she mouthed.
With a nod, Cecilia reached for a pita chip from the large bowl of complimentary snacks being shared by the table.
A little more than an hour after the group dispersed, with marching orders to bring viable action ideas to the next meeting, Spring outlined her idea to Cecelia.
“Spring, I’m not sure this is such a good idea,” Cecelia said.
Spring was behind the wheel of her Volvo car with Cecelia riding shotgun as they made their way to the Darling farmhouse. On the southern outskirts of town, the property known by locals as the Darling Homestead was now a mere fraction of the more than ten thousand acres it had been when the first Darling settled the property. Much of the city of Cedar Springs had originally been Darling land. What remained today was mostly undeveloped former farmland. The property included a rambling farmhouse that generations of Darlings had grown up in, a barn and silo, former stables and several unused outbuildings that had once been storage facilities or way-station cabins for farmhands to shelter in during storms.
Spring wanted to take a quick inventory and see what, if anything, would need to be done for the house to be in shape for a dinner party. Her mother had a service out every couple of weeks to dust and tend to the grass. Since she’d returned home to Cedar Springs from Georgia, Spring’s younger sister Summer went to the farm frequently to garden and to enjoy the quiet. Summer had restored the extensive gardens that once were carefully tended by their grandmothers. For all four Darling sisters, Spring, Summer, Winter and Autumn, the house in the country was a refuge, but for Summer it seemed to be even more than that. She’d come out, worked the garden and its flowers and sat on the front porch swing sipping lemonade as she’d worked through her relationship with Cameron Jackson.
For Spring, the history of the property and her family’s legacy and contribution to that history mattered even more.
“It’s so peaceful out here,” Cecelia said. “I always feel the stress just seeping away whenever I visit.”
“That’s why we love it,” Spring said. “You know you’re welcome to use the house whenever you want to get away.”
“Your mother has been trying to give me a key for years now.”
“You should take her up on it,” Spring said. She added a beat later, “Before it’s too late. As a matter of fact, there’s an extra in the kitchen at the house. I’ll give it to you today.”
As they drove, the terrain drifted almost imperceptibly from business to residential and then to tree-lined two-lane road. The trees gave way to open fields strewn with wild flowers on one side and an apple orchard on the other.
“Take it all in,” Spring said. “The orchard owner sold his parcels to the city six months ago. I made a counteroffer, a generous one, too.”
“You’re kidding,” Cecelia said. “You never said anything.”
Spring shook her head and swerved around a strip of tire rubber on the roadway.
“It all happened so fast,” she said. “You know how things work here. The girls even offered me their own money to increase the bid. But the city, via the economic development office, made him an offer he said he couldn’t refuse.”
“That’s just wrong.”
“But it’s how the game is played,” Spring said, “And from what I discovered in my research, I think he knew some of his land probably fell under one of those not quite clear titles. If the city was willing to pay him and sort out the titles, he was willing to take the cash and run.”
She pointed out the front windshield, adding, “This land abuts ours, so that’s how and when I knew the mayor or someone at city hall had a hand in the play that was in motion. Ross Parsons’s property abuts another small, now city-owned, property. Mayor Howell says the land-use consultant is surveying several sites, but mark my words, if David’s plans go forward, everything you’re seeing right now will be paved over. That will be asphalt instead of apple trees, and that barn over there,” she said, indicating a picturesque red barn with horses grazing nearby, “will be a big-box retailer open twenty-four hours a day and offering every imaginable convenience known and unneeded by man.”
Cecelia chuckled, a deep, throaty sound of amusement. “Your pioneer roots are showing.”
Spring glanced over at her and grinned. “They can’t be,” she said. “I just had a touch-up.”
“Ha! I knew those blond—”
“CeCe, look,” Spring interrupted and pointed out the front window.
Cecelia’s gaze followed the direction of Spring’s hand.
In the middle of the road, a good fifty yards in front of them, was a man. Although the day was fairly warm, he had on a long duster jacket reminiscent of something from the Old West.
“I think that’s Sweet Willie up there,” Cecelia said.
“Willie?” Spring said. “From Manna?”
She knew he was partial to her sister Summer’s cooking and always complimented her on the meals at Manna, the soup kitchen operated by the Common Ground ministries, whether it was a simple turkey sandwich on wheat bread or more elaborate fare.
“What is he doing way out here by himself?” Cecelia asked.
“The better question,” Spring said, “is how did he get out here? We’re a good twenty miles from downtown. Surely he didn’t walk.”
Since neither woman had an answer readily available, Spring continued driving toward him, closing the distance between them in a manner of moments.
He’d turned at the sound of the car and shuffled to the side of the road.
“I have a first-aid kit in the trunk,” Spring said. “I hope he’s not injured. He’s such a sweet man.”
The man known as Sweet Willie stood at the side of the road. A scowl marred his pecan-brown features; the mouth that was usually turned up in a smile of welcome didn’t seem at all pleased to see them.
“What is he up to?” Spring said.
Cecelia glanced at her. “Why does he have to be up to something? Because he’s a black man on a country road?”
Spring heard a note of defensiveness in her friend’s voice. “I didn’t mean anything by it, Cecelia. I’d ask the same question of anyone out on this road, black, white or otherwise.”
“I know,” Cecelia said, conceding the point. “There’s just something off about him.”
“What do you mean?” Spring asked as they drew up alongside the man, who was suddenly smiling from ear to ear.
“Like there’s another layer or layers to him,” Cecelia said as Spring put the car in Park. “It’s just a vibe I get,” she added. “He’s very well-spoken.”
“Now who is doing the stereotyping?” Spring asked. “An elderly black and homeless man can’t be well-spoken? And are we talking about the same Sweet Willie? When I talk to him, he sounds like an older man, someone who came of age in a time when things were different.”
“That’s just it,” Cecelia said, slipping on sunglasses. “I don’t think he’s as elderly as he lets people assume.”
By the time they got out of the car, Sweet Willie looked the way he usually looked, of an indeterminate but advanced age, slightly stooped and bearing the smile that warmed so many hearts at Manna, the Common Ground soup kitchen.
“Well, look at what the good Lord has sent my way,” he said. “Two pretty ladies to rescue me in my time of need.”
“Sweet Willie,” Spring said, giving him as thorough a once-over as she could—for
the second time in two days. She was relieved to see that he suffered no visible wounds or distress. “What in the world are you doing so far out here in the country?”
“The country is a good place to think, Doc,” he said. Then, with a nod acknowledging Cecelia, he added, “Dr. Jeffries.”
The tall black woman nodded but didn’t say anything, her inscrutable expression hard to read. Spring thought it contained more than a smidgen of suspicion. She wondered about her friend’s reaction to the homeless man. Cecelia was a fairly decent judge of character, so her suspicion of and response to Willie were fairly disconcerting.
“Can we give you a ride back into town?” Spring asked.
Willie’s gaze left hers and focused on something over Spring’s shoulder. She turned to see what had captured his attention.
A motorcycle driver was headed down the road, the lone figure a dark blur at the moment. She turned back to face Willie, concerned about the elderly man.
“It’s a nice day for a ride,” Willie said, watching intently as the biker approached and then passed them.
Spring and Cecelia shared a glance. Spring held out her arm, directing him toward the car. “Come on,” she said. “We can drop you off wherever you’d like.”
With a final glance toward the disappearing motorcyclist, the man let them lead him to the car, where Spring got him settled and buckled into the front seat while Cecelia slipped into the backseat.
Their conversation back into town was short. Willie fell asleep almost as soon as the car started moving. His head lolled against the window, and he issued periodic snorts and snuffles.
“He was wide-awake not five minutes ago,” Cecelia said from the backseat.
“I hope he’s all right,” Spring said. “I wonder when he last had a physical checkup. I wish he’d come to the clinic for an assessment. Hand me my purse, will you?”
“Not while you’re driving,” Cecelia said.
Spring met her friend’s gaze in the rearview mirror and shook her head. “Between you and Summer, you could do a commercial for the DMV about distracted driving. Every time I turn around she’s telling someone, ‘No texting and driving.’ As if I text a lot.”
Love Inspired May 2015 #1 Page 28
