by Tamar Myers
That’s what tipped me off! I still didn’t know if Greg and Mama were in cahoots, but I did know that my dearly beloved tends to take a more enlightened position when it comes to feeding and caring for his mother-in-law. My husband’s basic philosophy was that Mama is an adult and can do what she pleases, as long as she is of sound mind and does not unduly hurt herself.
It’s the “sound mind” part that we disagreed on most. “Let’s not forget, dear,” I said, drawing myself up to my full four feet nine inches, “that she is my mother.”
“Amen, hallelujah, and pass the peas,” Mama said, “I hear his car now.” She darted into the hall closet like a purple martin, and emerged with a mink stole.
By then my turncoat husband was on his feet, insisting that he help his mother-in-law with the difficult process of laying the stole across her narrow shoulders—a stole, for Pete’s sake. It’s not like it had sleeves.
Fortunately, that meant she was ready when the doorbell rang and I didn’t even have to look at the Timber Snake, much less invite him in. Nonetheless, the quiet evening at home together that Greg and I had planned was about to get even quieter than either of us had anticipated.
“Gregory,” I said archly, “just so you know, there will be no jumpy-jumpy for you tonight,”
“Jumpy-jumpy? What’s that?”
“You’ll just have to wait to find out.”
There was indeed no jumpy-jumpy for Greg, although I was jumpy all night, because Mama didn’t return until six in the morning. I slept fitfully, if at all, and would have called the police, except that my ex-detective husband insisted that it would do no good. She was an adult of sound mind, yada yada yada. And when I tried to jump out of bed at six, I found a strong pair of hands restraining me.
“Abby, hon—”
“Don’t you ‘hon’ me. How would you feel if it was your mama in my mama’s shoes?”
“Shocked and relieved.” Greg’s mother is—and I will try to put this kindly—a religious fanatic who wears her hair in what he refers to as a “holy-roller bun,” and who firmly believes that Satan controls the airwaves. I think Greg would be happy if his mother became Amish, because outwardly she’d have to make precious few changes, but it would undoubtedly make her a kinder, gentler person.
“Greg, I can’t take this anymore! The ick factor alone is about to kill me.”
Much to the surprise of both of us, I let him put his arms around me. “Abby, we don’t know for sure if the ick factor is even warranted. Jumping to conclusions might be the only form of exercise your friend Magdalena Yoder gets, but it can lead to a serious case of egg on the face—and trust me, that’s not your best look. Since you seem determined to play the adversarial role, at least allow me to play devil’s advocate, and I’ll try and get the details. But you have to stay out of it. You hear?”
“I hear.”
“You promise?”
“Yeah,” I muttered.
I feigned sleep for the next hour, but even Mario Lopez couldn’t have kept me in bed when I smelled bacon frying in my kitchen. I hopped out of bed and, without bothering to put on a robe, stormed off to confront my minimadre. Yet when I saw her standing in front of the stove in a pale blue silk dress and a white organza apron, I saw Betty and Bud Anderson’s mother, not my own.
“Coffee, dear?” she asked.
“Funny, I couldn’t smell that over the bacon.”
“It’s Virginia ham. Only the best for my daughter.”
On her way to get the coffee she peeked into the top oven.
“Mama, what’s in there?”
“Why, biscuits of course.”
“Mama, what are you doing?”
“What I always do on Sunday morning: I’m cooking breakfast for my loved ones.”
“Your loved ones are always asleep at this hour on Sunday morning.” I yawned to prove my point.
“Let me stir the grits, dear, and I’ll be right with you.”
I poured my own coffee and dumped in extra sugar, hoping to get a better jolt. The second I sat down again, a fifteen pound blond male jumped into my lap and started to dance. Well, sort of. Dmitri is always happy to see me awake in the morning, even if he’s spent the night in my bed. And I love him enough to be arrested in at least three states, but it is dang hard to sip one’s coffee with a cat’s tail whipping across one’s face.
While I was setting him on the floor and gently urging him to show his affection elsewhere, Mama resumed her explanation. “If you must know,” she said, careful to avoid eye contact, “I’m going to Sunday school this morning,”
I sputtered a mouthful of dark, sweet fluid. “Whoa! This I’ve got to see. I’m coming too.”
“I’m going to St. Michael’s.”
“Why? You belong to Grace. If you’re going to switch, at least switch to St. Stephen’s or St. Mark’s.” The Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina is, by and large, extremely conservative, and its officials were outraged at the nomination of Gene Robinson, an openly gay bishop. St. Stephen’s and St. Mark’s have reportedly been much more accepting of gays than most area Episcopal churches.
“The person I’ll be attending with does not approve of gays, Abby.”
“What do you mean by ‘approve of’?”
Mama suddenly found it necessarily to stir the grits vigorously.
I jumped up. After all, the ham slices needed turning—or more likely, to be removed from the stove altogether.
“Mama, are we talking about Buford? Because when we were married, he wasn’t homophobic.”
“Well, he’s not dear—not socially. He just feels that in the religious sphere, they should submit to—uh—majority rule.”
“Repent and disappear? Mama, the Rob-Bobs are like sons to you. They certainly treat you better than your own son, Toy, whom, by the way, I’ve always suspected was—uh, never mind.”
“Was what, dear? Were you going to say gay? Well, I asked him, and he said he wasn’t.”
“And Toy’s never lied?”
“I knew you’d say that, so I asked him again. He said the same thing: no. And even if he was, Abby, you know it wouldn’t matter to me. You know that I am very tolerant, and I taught you to accept everyone—Why shoot a monkey! My biscuits are burning!”
I waited until she was through fanning a pan of biscuits as black as Buford’s heart. “Mama, I believe I’ll be going back to bed now.”
“But my breakfast!”
“I’m sorry, Mama, but I’ve lost my appetite.”
She sighed. “Maybe it’s just as well that the biscuits burned. They turned out extremely heavy for some reason.”
“In that case,” I said, “take them to Sunday school with you. If you see adulterers, you can throw the biscuits at them.”
“I don’t think Buford would like that,” Mama said, and then despite our mutually hurt feelings, we laughed until we cried.
Greg generally goes to bed with a clear conscience, and invariably wakes up each morning with a mind as empty as a newborn baby’s. He tells me that these are good traits, but I’m not so sure about the empty mind. Case in point: the morning Mama burned the biscuits, Greg awoke unable—or perhaps unwilling—to recall that we had quarreled the night before.
“Whatever happened, I’m sure we were equally at fault,” he said.
“Grrrr!”
“Oh come on, hon, I’m sure I didn’t behave that badly. After all, you didn’t have me sleep on the couch.”
“We don’t own a couch, Greg.”
“Well, in the guest room, then. Say, what do you want to do today—besides argue?”
“Frankly—”
“Because I was thinking of going over to Mount Pleasant. Booger and I are finally getting around to putting a head on the boat. It came in Friday, but I didn’t get a chance to even open the crate yesterday. Booger will be meeting me at the slip at eleven. You want to come along and watch?”
First of all, it was mighty kind of my husband to invite me to be a part
of his day. And while having a head on the Abby would make going out on the water a whole lot more fun, staying in dock to watch the men attach a toilet to a redolent shrimp boat was not my idea of a fun way to spend a Sunday morning.
However, some snooping (with my big strong husband safely close by), while not exactly fun, would certainly be entertaining. I took a moment to compose myself. After all, faking nonchalance isn’t as easy as one might think.
“Sure, that sounds all right. Hey, why don’t I make some sandwiches, and I’ll bring a book. Then you guys can work on the boat all you want. I mean, didn’t you also want to poop on the deck?”
Greg roared with laughter. “We want to varnish the poop deck, darling.”
I managed a grin. “Yeah, that was pretty stupid of me. You’d think that I would know better,” I said.
“Abby, you’re a hoot,” Greg said as he reached for me.
“And maybe a fool,” I whispered.
15
No project has ever proceeded smoothly from the tools of Gregory Washburn and Booger Smith. First, the hole they cut for the pipes was too small, then too large, then the seal cracked, and on and on the project went—or so I’m told. I don’t have firsthand experience because after watching them for only five minutes, I claimed to be bored. Then I casually expressed a desire to stroll over to the Old Village. Greg grunted a response, but since he was a man involved in a repair project, it meant absolutely nothing. Nor did Booger’s exceptionally loud belch.
Still, my conscience was as clear as the sky that morning (which was a lot more than Mama could say). Shem Creek was sparkling in the sunlight, the shrimp boats gently bobbing, the sea grass softly sighing, and at least a dozen other clichés were happening all around me, so that by the time I got out of earshot of grunting Greg and belching Booger, I was feeling pretty chipper. When I got to Royal Street, my spirits were positively buoyant.
Of course I was a woman on a mission. The enigmatic Lady Bowfrey was not to be forewarned this time. I’d purposely dressed in winter browns and grays, hoping to blend in with the sidewalks and dormant centipede lawns. Someday I was going to learn to rappel and sharpen my tree-climbing skills, so I could move through the canopy like a life-size, if somewhat deformed, spider monkey. The thing is, no one ever looked up—least of all me. But with the ancient live oaks that still survive in parts of Mount Pleasant, there really is a potential for a highway of sorts in the sky.
“Oops, I’m sorry!” It’s that silly kind of thinking that gets me into trouble each time. In this case I’d plowed full force into a woman a good ten years older than Mama, almost knocking her to the ground.
“I’m all right,” she gasped. “My dear, you must be one of those writers.”
“I beg your pardon?” I put a hand to steady her, but she stepped back to let me know she was fine the way she was.
“Our famous local writers. They wander about our streets with minds off in faraway places. No doubt in their banks accounts, ha ha.”
I was too puzzled to respond.
She scanned my face. “Oh dear, you’re not one of them, are you?”
“I’m afraid not. Tell me about them.”
“Oh, they’re a reclusive bunch. Some live here on the mainland, some on the islands. I’ve run into a few of them in the stores, but I’m too shy to approach them—one in particular; she always seems to be scowling. Although I think I heard she moved to Charlotte—good riddance, I say. But anyway, I’ve tried to read their books, but I can’t get into them. Pat Conroy they’re not.”
“Well, I’m ashamed to say that the last book I read was Eat, Pray, Love. I enjoyed it, by the way. But then again, I’m only an antiques dealer.”
“That’s where I know you from! The Den of Iniquity, right?”
“Funny that everyone says that. It’s actually the Den of Sobriety.”
“It is? Then I’ve been saying it wrong all these years. No wonder all the friends I recommend it to can’t seem to find it.”
“You’re putting me on now, aren’t you?”
“Weren’t you?”
“I like you, Miss—uh—”
“Dora.”
“I’m Abby.”
“Are you a newcomer to Mount Pleasant, Abby?”
“No. I don’t actually live here; I live downtown.”
“An S.O.B. Well, la-dee-da.”
“Yes, but you live on the Pleasant side of the Cooper River.”
She laughed delightedly. “Very true! What brings you here?”
“My husband and his cousin have a shrimp boat that ties up at Shem Creek. They’re putting in a toilet today.”
“Is it a Toto?”
“Toto lly not. On a shrimp boat? We’re not that la-dee-da. Anyway, I’d rather spend my time walking around the Old Village than handing them wrenches.”
“You’ve obviously been here before.”
“Off and on for the last forty-some years. I’m originally from Rock Hill, but my family used to vacation at the beach. How long have you lived here, Miss Dora?” As a native Southerner, I knew that many ladies of the older generation, whether married or single, preferred to be addressed by the honorific “Miss” when called by their first name.
“Three hundred years—give or take.”
That was what I needed to hear to make my day. “So you’re a native.”
“Uh-oh, you’re not going to hold that against me, are you?”
“I’ll try not to. But I must confess that ever since I moved to Charleston I’ve suffered from a mild case of aboriginal envyitis.”
“Abby, the church folk are about to let out. Would you like to come in and have a cup of tea? This is my house right here—and I would so enjoy your company. I am a widder woman, you know.”
“A what?”
“A widder woman; my husband is deceased.”
“That’s what I thought you said. I didn’t know the locals still used such a quaint expression.”
“They don’t, but I do. I think it’s colorful.”
That did it. Here was an eccentric older woman, one unconnected with Buford the Timber Snake, one who might possibly know Lady Bowfrey—or at least know of her. Bad reputations, like pebbles tossed into ponds, have far reaching spheres of influence.
“I’d be happy to have tea with a widder woman,” I said. Although my game plan had changed slightly, my mission was still the same.
You can always tell a family’s history by the amount of silver that is displayed in the dining room. Dora’s sideboard was groaning from the weight of a bath-size sterling punch bowl and cups the size of margarine tubs. A massive tea set took up most of the dining room table, and two glass cabinets were so full of silver odds and ends that it was impossible to keep the doors securely latched.
But instead of using her heirlooms to make and serve the tea, Dora boiled water in a red enamel kettle and poured it into a blue and green painted mug that had once belonged to Truman Capote.
“I bought it at Disney World,” she explained. “There’s a shop there that sells all kinds of things that were once owned by celebrities.”
“Were you a fan of his?”
“Not so much—not really. I just thought it would make a nice story.”
“And so it does.” I sipped from the same spot where presumably Truman’s lips had once pressed. “Ah, that’s good tea.”
“Here’s to Lady Grey,” she said, and held aloft an orange mug of humbler origins.
“I bet you must know everyone in Mount Pleasant.”
“Of course, dear—well, anyone who is anyone. I mean, I certainly don’t know all the carpetbaggers. And the Mexicans,” she added in a low voice.
“By carpetbaggers, may I assume that you mean Northern retirees?”
“You may. I suppose that I’ve met a few good ones along the way. I must have, don’t you think? But they so look down on us. Because they think we speak with an accent, therefore we must be uneducated.”
“I believe that attitude
is changing. My husband’s cousin, by the way, is from an old Mount Pleasant family. They don’t live in the Old Village, but farther north along Rifle Range.”
That certainly got her attention. “What is his name?”
“Booger Smith. His daddy is Estus Claybill Smith and his mama is Rae Lee—shoot, I can’t remember her maiden name.”
“Pinochet. I know the family well. I used to babysit for Estus and his five brothers when they lived in closer to town. Why, I’ll be, Abby, you’re practically family.”
“Just as long as I’m not kissing cousins to Booger Smith; he comes by that name honestly.”
Dora laughed. “Like father, like son. Oh, the stories I could tell.”
I took another long sip of Lady Grey and carefully set Truman’s mug down. “Miss Dora, do you know a family named Bowfrey?”
My new friend scowled just as sternly as that unpleasant author who has thankfully taken her bad attitude with her to Charlotte. “A family, no, but a single woman, yes. She calls herself Lady—some sort of foreign aristocracy—and I tell you, Abby, she is bad news.”
I tried to adopt the demeanor of an eager young gossip. Sadly, it wasn’t hard to do.
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Do you think she’s like the head of a smuggling ring or something?”
Dora’s pale blue eyes widened and she had to struggle to return her mouthful of tea into the cup, rather than spray it hither, thither, and especially on me. “What did you say?”
“Well she is very sinister looking, isn’t she?”
“I can’t say that I’ve ever thought of that. Harriet—that’s Lady Bowfrey’s real name—is the sweetest woman this side of Heaven. When Rutledge died she couldn’t have taken better care of me. She insisted that I come stay with her, had her cook make my favorite meals—not that I was ever hungry—”
“But you say she was bad news!”
“She is, my dear: at poker! Harriet is a fabulous bridge player. A group of us used to get together every Wednesday night and play. Then someone suggested poker, so a couple of us widows who had nothing to do on weekends started adding Saturday poker to our schedules. And oh what fun we’ve had. But let me tell you, dear, Harriet Bowfrey is the most formidable poker player you will ever hope to meet. She is absolutely inscrutable. I lost my shirt to her again last night.”
