Waking Up in Dixie

by Haywood Smith

  Elizabeth hadn’t intended to punish the man. “Lord, Howe, it’s not the end of the world.” She was royally ticked off at him, but he looked so defeated. “I don’t expect you to be perfect. Nobody does, not even God. I just want you to talk to me about things. No more plots.” She exhaled sharply. “It feels way too much like before. I can’t go back to the way things were before.”

  He winced. “Okay. No more plots.” He unhooked his seat belt, a thoughtful expression replacing his discouraged one. “Okay.”

  They both got out. He turned to her and said across the hood of the car, “Sheesh. Maybe I ought to become a Baptist,” in an effort to lighten things up. “Or better yet, a Pentecostal.”

  He waggled his eyebrows at her. “What would you say to that?”

  In spite of herself, Elizabeth had to laugh. “Your mother would have a heart attack.”

  He grinned, clearly glad to see her temper ease. “If I did, would you come with me?”

  Lord, he could be winsome when he wanted to. “No. But feel free to try it if you want to. I just want to be there to see the look on your mother’s face when you tell her. And Patti’s.”

  “I’ll talk to you about it before I do anything rash,” he quipped.

  The phone was ringing as they came inside. Probably Howe’s mother calling to weigh in. Howe headed for the cordless receiver on the credenza. “I’ll get it.” He picked it up. “Hello?”

  A surprised look claimed his features. “Oh, hi.”

  Not his mother.

  He turned his back to Elizabeth, reminding her of many a suspicious phone call from the past.

  Elizabeth’s antennae went up.

  “I guess that would be okay,” Howe told the caller. “What time works for you?” He straightened. “Oh, really? Well, I don’t see why not. I’m free.” Pause. “Okay, then. Thirty minutes, it is.” He hung up and replaced the receiver.

  “And who was that?” she asked.

  He turned, a mischievous look on his face. “The Baptist minister. He wants to have a chat.”

  Baptist minister, indeed. Was he lying?

  Elizabeth didn’t ask. She had no stomach for confrontation after the debacle at church.

  Patricia clambered down from upstairs to halt on the landing and confront them. “Daddy! What have you done? I have never been so mortified in all my life! Five people have called me about it already.”

  “I guess the blood’s in the water,” Howe told Elizabeth dryly.

  “I guess it is,” she said. “And I’m leaving this one to you to clean up after.”

  As he headed up the stairs to do just that, Elizabeth’s cell phone rang. She fished it out of her purse. Out of area. “Hello?”

  “I just heard,” P.J. told her. “Elizabeth, I’m concerned for your safety. The man’s not right. I really think you should leave him. Or get him to leave. It can’t be safe for you, the way things are.”

  Elizabeth bristled at his proprietary manner. “Who told you?” Did he have somebody from Whittington reporting to him?

  “That doesn’t matter,” he dismissed.

  “It matters to me,” she retorted. Howe was loopy, but he wasn’t dangerous. “I was there. You weren’t.” Why was she defending Howe?

  “I heard the meeting ended up in a brawl,” P.J. countered.

  “That’s nonsense,” she said, surprised by her own protectiveness. “Tempers flared, but Howe didn’t hurt anybody. All he did was challenge their hidebound attitudes and try to get them to help the hard-hit members of the church. It wasn’t tactful, but it wasn’t aggressive. Keith McDonald was the one who was aggressive. If he’d treated me the way he treated Howe, I’d have coldcocked the old blowhard, but Howe didn’t.”

  P.J. chuckled. “I’ll bet you would have.”

  Where was P.J., anyway? Listening over the transom at St. Andrew’s? “How did you find out what happened so fast?” she demanded. “My car’s not even cold from bringing him home. Where are you?”

  “It doesn’t matter where I am,” he answered.

  She’d tolerated that deflection one time too many. “When I ask you a question, it matters,” she bit out, focusing all her frustrations on that. “And I expect a real answer. If you ever patronize me again by saying it doesn’t matter, I’ll hang up and block your number from every phone I can get hold of, and it will be the last you’ll ever see or hear of me.”

  “Whoa,” he soothed. “Sorry. Force of habit. I say that in business all the time, but I promise not to answer you that way ever again,” he said. “I care about you, Elizabeth. What you’re going through. How you feel. I want to see you. Help you.”

  He’d said the same thing so many times before, and she’d been drawn in by it, but this time, P.J.’s declaration of concern didn’t ring true.

  Elizabeth’s phone beeped in, giving her a welcome excuse to end the conversation. “I have to go. I have another call.”

  P.J. didn’t respond.

  To her surprise, Augusta’s name and number showed on the screen.

  Elizabeth told P.J., “I’ve got my hands full, here. I’ll get back to you once things have settled down, but I can’t talk about any of this now, and I can’t come to Atlanta. Please give me some space to get things straightened out.”

  His response was a cool, “If you insist. But I still don’t like it that nobody’s looking out for you in all this.”

  In the past, that would have made her feel appreciated. Now, it only made her feel pressured, for some reason. And annoyed. Maybe it was his paternalistic attitude. “I’m a big girl. I can look out for myself.” She ended the call, and the phone beeped again.

  Elizabeth looked at the phone’s screen and considered not switching over to Augusta’s call, but putting Augusta off only made the woman more vicious. So she braced herself and answered. “Hello.”

  “Elizabeth, this is your mother-in-law.” Augusta’s tone was brisk. “After that railroad job at guild, I vowed to wash my hands of you. But subsequent events have prompted me to reconsider for the sake of the family.” That was new! Augusta never reconsidered anything. “For Patricia’s sake,” she went on, “I’m willing to put my feelings aside. The time has come for you and me to ally ourselves.”

  Elizabeth couldn’t believe her ears. Augusta never forgave anyone after she’d written them off. The woman had half a dozen grudges older than Elizabeth, still as fresh as when some slight, real or imagined, had created them. “What would possibly make you want to do that, Augusta?” Elizabeth asked mildly.

  “Howe is clearly ill. He must be sent where he can get help,” her mother-in-law announced. “Somewhere he cannot humiliate the family, for as long as it takes him to come to his senses. No self-respecting man in his right mind would have done what he did at that vestry meeting. My lawyer is drawing up the commitment papers as we speak.”

  She couldn’t be serious! “Augusta, while I agree Howe’s behavior was embarrassing—and ill-advised—it was hardly grounds to have him put away.”

  “He insulted the vestry and every member of our church,” his mother accused. “And he was violent!”

  “He was not violent,” Elizabeth defended. God only knew what people were saying. “I was there. Even when he was seriously provoked, he didn’t get physical. Granted, there were some heated arguments going on, and Keith McDonald tried to get rough, but there was no violence.”

  “You’re his wife,” Augusta dismissed. “Of course you’re going to put the best possible complexion on the matter, but our family name is being dragged through the mud all over town. This cannot continue.”

  Elizabeth decided she might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. “Augusta, Howe is your son. Why are you so quick to throw him under the bus? I should think you’d defend him, especially after what he’s been through.”

  “Do not dare to lecture me about my own son, missy,” Augusta ordered. “I’m only thinking of what’s best for him. He’ll thank me in the end. How will he feel after he comes to
his senses if we let him run amok now?”

  “What if he has come to his senses?” Elizabeth challenged. “What if this is the man he’s going to be?”

  Augusta had no answer for that.

  “I’ll admit,” Elizabeth went on, “he’s impulsive and lacks the filters the rest of us have. But he means so well, and he’s heartfelt in his convictions.”

  “They’re not convictions,” Augusta minced out. “They’re delusions.”

  Five minutes before, Elizabeth would have agreed with her assessment, but suddenly she realized she’d rather have this Howe, just the way he was, than the old one. “The last time I looked, we still had freedom of speech and religion. If what Howe did was insane, every evangelical in the country would be in an asylum.”

  “Maybe they should be,” Augusta retorted. “And leave things to those of us with a proper sense of decorum.”

  What arrogance!

  This was getting nowhere. “Augusta, I won’t help you put Howe away. It’s wrong.”

  “Then I’ll have to take care of it on my own,” she threatened. “And you know I have the means to do it.”

  Augusta was more connected than Georgia Power, especially in medical and judicial circles, so when she said she could do something, she could. Her threats were never idle.

  “Try,” Elizabeth threatened right back, “and I’ll go to the media. I’ll bet Dr. Phil or Oprah would love a story like this. Cruel banker wakes up born again and shakes up hidebound church. Maybe The 700 Club.”

  “You wouldn’t,” Augusta said.

  “Try me.”

  Augusta’s only response was to hang up.

  Elizabeth took it as a victory, but she knew better than to think the matter was over. Augusta was sneaky.

  Elizabeth decided to call Howe’s lawyer and have him put things in place to counter any effort by Augusta to have Howe committed. Then she and Howe needed to talk. For all their sakes, he had to tone things down.

  She’d just hung up from telling their lawyer what was going on when the doorbell rang, and she answered to find not one, but two, beaming Baptist ministers on her doorstep.

  “Good day, Mrs. Whittington,” the senior pastor said. “I’m Pastor Lightman from First Baptist, and this is my associate, Pastor Graves. We called earlier.”

  So he hadn’t been lying.

  “Is Brother Howell available to speak with us?” the minister asked.

  Only if she was present to make sure nothing else went wrong. “Come in. We’re both looking forward to your visit.”

  She led the two men to the sitting room. “Please make yourselves comfortable.” At least somebody would be. “I’ll go get my husband.” Only if he promised to behave himself. And not become a Baptist. That day, anyway.

  Three hours of spirited theology later, Patricia showed up at the sitting room door and said Howe needed to take her to the mall. With a pained smile for the ministers, she assured them it was an emergency.

  Worn out from trying to make sure Howe didn’t go overboard and change churches without serious consideration, Elizabeth stood, signaling an end to the conversation. “Patti, your father will be with you in a minute.” She turned to the ministers. “We’ll have to continue this fascinating discussion another time, but thank you so much for coming.”

  Pastor Lightman pumped her hand with enthusiasm. “Indeed. I’ll look forward to it.”

  Once they were gone, and Howe had ridden off with Patti behind the wheel of the family car, Elizabeth collapsed on the sofa in the family room and closed her eyes. What a day.

  Any more like that one, and they’d have to commit her.

  She must have dozed, but woke to a metallic taste in her mouth and the sound of the front door chimes.

  Damn. What now?

  After a deep sigh, she rose to find Augusta on the doorstep. Patti’s emergency trip with her father suddenly made sense.

  Damn, damn, damn. Elizabeth motioned her mother-in-law inside. “Come in, Augusta.”

  Her mother-in-law stepped inside and gasped in horror. “You have ruined the wainscoting,” she accused. “And the windows are naked, for every burglar and common passerby to see in!”

  Elizabeth smiled in satisfaction. “Yes. Howe insisted, and we love it.” She motioned toward the kitchen. “I was just about to have a drink in the family room. A large one. Would you care to join me?”

  Augusta nodded curtly. “I’ll have a double sherry.”

  Elizabeth made the drinks while Augusta perched in a wing-backed chair. She waited to speak till Elizabeth handed her the sherry, then sat facing her. After a hefty swig, Augusta said, “I’ve come to plead with you to reconsider your position on Howe’s hospitalization. Please, Elizabeth. Before he does something he’ll regret for the rest of his life.”

  Something Augusta would regret.

  Elizabeth started to launch into a defense of Howe’s actions, but something in her mother-in-law’s haunted expression reminded her of the way Howe had looked when Elizabeth had taken him to task for not considering her feelings before he did anything, and it occurred to her that she’d never granted Augusta the same courtesy. She’d always been too intimidated. Too defensive. So she’d judged Augusta just as harshly as Augusta had ever judged her.

  The realization pricked her conscience deeply, bringing the thin, elegant woman into a fresh perspective. For the first time in all those years, she put herself in Augusta’s place, and a sad place it was, indeed.

  Seeing her sitting there, so rigid and fearful and angry, Elizabeth comprehended how isolated Howe’s mother had always been. How lonely it must be to inspire only fear instead of friendship or affection in those closest to her. How empty, to be more obsessed with what people thought than with enjoying the blessings she had.

  Not that anyone was responsible for that but Augusta.

  Still, for the first time, Elizabeth actually felt pity for Howe’s mother.

  Not that being nice would get her anywhere with the woman. So Elizabeth decided to address the issue in terms Augusta could understand. “Augusta, I won’t go into why it’s wrong to try to commit Howe, which it is. I’ll simply point out that it won’t work. You haven’t taken Howe into consideration in all this. I agree that his recent behavior is embarrassing, but he’s not insane, and he’s nobody’s fool. He may not have practiced law, but he was one of the best they ever had in Moot Court at Emory.”

  Augusta’s eyes lost focus, moving from side to side as she saw the glaring fault in her plan of action.

  “If you try to commit him,” Elizabeth concluded, “he’ll fight it, and he’ll win. Then the whole mess won’t just be all over town; it’ll be all over the news, even in Atlanta. So what would you have accomplished?”

  Augusta drained her tiny goblet of sherry without flinching. “Much as I hate to admit it, Elizabeth, you have a point.” Her posture sagged as she gripped the edge of her seat and stared unseeing at her great-grandmother’s Oriental carpet. “This is all so . . . humiliating. I dare not show my face outside my door.”

  “Then don’t,” Elizabeth told her. “Take a trip with one of your friends. A royal tour of Scotland. Or Ireland. Better yet, take a cruise. Around the world, if you want. You can afford it. And don’t come back till this blows over.” She smiled. “It will blow over, Augusta. Howe’s getting better every day,” she said, ignoring the possibility that he might not be. “He just needs time. There’s no reason for you to have to endure all the day-to-day ups and downs. Take a nice, long trip. He’ll be better when you get back.”

  Augusta straightened, her eyes narrowing. “You’re just trying to get rid of me.”

  Please. “No I’m not. I just want you to enjoy yourself for once. Be happy.”

  “I might expect such talk from you.” Her mother-in-law set the empty sherry goblet decisively on the table beside her chair. “We are not put on this earth to be happy. We are put here to be righteous. To suffer and to sacrifice.” She stood to glare down at Elizabeth.<
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  “Oh, Augusta.” Elizabeth rose. “Howe may be screwed up at the moment, but at least he realizes now how important it is to feel things. To laugh, and cry, and experience joy. I wish you could feel that, too.”

  “Rubbish.” Augusta’s thin lips pursed. “Now he’s got you spouting nonsense. I can see that this was a waste of my time. I’m leaving.”

  Elizabeth had an idea as she followed her mother-in-law toward the front door. “I’ll bet Patti would love to travel with you, and it would be good for her to see more than her own little corner of the world. Maybe y’all could take a trip together.”

  Augusta lifted a haughty shoulder. “How convenient that would be for you, to have both of us out of the way.” She looked Elizabeth up and down with disdain, but this time, her contempt had no power to sting. “Good-bye, Elizabeth.” She darted a scornful glance around the renovation. “Do your best to keep Howell under control, before he destroys his reputation completely . . . and this house.”

  Elizabeth tempered her response with kindness, but spoke her mind. “I don’t want a man who can be controlled, Augusta,” she said. “Any more than I wanted to be controlled for all those years—by Howe and by you.” She lifted her brows. “It was my fault. I let you both do it. But I know better now.” She opened the front door. “I’m glad Howe’s the way he is.”

  Saying it, she realized she meant it.

  “Then you’re as unstable as he is,” Augusta snapped, sailing past her toward the car where poor Thomas was waiting behind the wheel.

  “Good-bye, Augusta.” For the first time in more than a quarter of a century, Elizabeth closed the door on her mother-in-law without resentment. She actually didn’t give a flying flip what the woman thought of her. For that, if for nothing else, everything that had happened since breakfast was worth it.

  Without Augusta hanging over her like a vulture anymore, maybe Elizabeth really could work things out with Howe. Assuming he did get better . . . and didn’t go off the deep end and become a televangelist, or anything.