Letter From Home

by Carolyn Hart

  “Cousin Hilda means well.” Gretchen heard the echo of her grandmother’s voice in her own. “Please don’t pay any attention to what she says. And she is good to come so Grandmother can get some rest. She hasn’t had much sleep since Mrs. Tatum was killed, what with everything that’s happened on our street.”

  Mrs. Perkins’s brown eyes gleamed. “That’s right. You live almost next door, don’t you?” She shivered, bent close to Gretchen. “Do you know what I heard the sheriff—”

  “Mrs. Perkins, I’ll take a piece of Lotte’s apple pie,” Mayor Burkett called out from table one.

  Mrs. Perkins swung around, hurried behind the counter.

  At the third stool, his regular place, Dr. Jamison finished his bowl of vegetable soup. “Hmm, that looks good. Cut one for me.”

  Every table was taken, every booth filled. A group of officers from Camp Crowder had pushed two tables together. Gretchen darted in and out of the kitchen, taking orders, filling cups and glasses, clearing tables. She took bites from a BLT as she came and went.

  Mrs. Perkins pushed through the door, carrying a full tray of dirty dishes. She emptied the scraps and stacked the plates by Cousin Hilda, who bent over the sink, water rushing. Cousin Hilda, her face flushed from the heat, gestured at the garbage pail with a spatula. “That’s full. Dump it.”

  Mrs. Perkins’s face closed up like a box turtle.

  Gretchen hurried to the pail. “I’ll get it.” She grabbed the metal rung and pulled.

  Mrs. Perkins stood still for a moment, then, with a sniff, joined Gretchen. The two of them slid the pail across the floor. When the screen door banged shut behind them and they thumped the pail down the steps into the alley, Mrs. Perkins muttered, “If I didn’t like Lotte, I’d go home and let her”—the pronoun bristled with resentment—“see how she’d like doing this by herself. Maybe she could learn how to say please.”

  Gretchen watched the back door. She whispered, “Mrs. Perkins, what did the sheriff say?”

  The alley pulsed with heat. Mrs. Perkins lifted her hand to brush a strand of lank brown hair away from her flushed face. “Oh, it was awful, but I couldn’t help hearing. He was telling Mr. Durwood about the autopsy report they did on poor Faye.” She shivered. “The sheriff said they found skin and blood underneath her fingernails.”

  “Skin and blood . . .” Gretchen repeated slowly. “I don’t understand.”

  “Oh, don’t you see?” Mrs. Perkins slipped behind Gretchen, clamped her fingers on Gretchen’s throat.

  Startled, Gretchen lifted her hands, reached back, fastened on Mrs. Perkins’s bony arms.

  Mrs. Perkins loosed her grip. Her arms fell. She stood so close, her breath was warm on Gretchen’s face. “Faye tried to get the hands off her neck. The sheriff said she fought real hard. She had long nails. He said Faye must have marked him up pretty good.”

  “WELL, I’LL BE damned.” Ralph Cooley thumped his desk with his fist. “Now it makes sense. I thought the chief had lost his mind. Last night he showed up at the Blue Light, made every man jack hold out his arms for a look-see. Nobody could figure out what the hell. But he was looking for scratches. He didn’t find any. That pretty much shoots a hole in his theory that somebody followed Faye home Tuesday night ’Course, it could have been somebody who isn’t a regular. But I’d think the chief would know pretty much who was there Tuesday night and probably checked on all of them.” Cooley’s eyes narrowed. “Maybe he’ll trade off. Give me some good stuff if I don’t use this. Thanks, Gretchen.” He lit a cigarette, looked pleased.

  Gretchen turned away. She didn’t like Ralph Cooley. She didn’t like the way he talked, the way he looked, the way he thought. Faye Tatum’s murder was a game to him. His words hung in her mind; all he cared about was the story he could write. She walked slowly to her desk, sat down. She needed to make some calls. But the cold, quiet question slid into her mind. What did she care about? The story she would write . . .

  BETTY STEELE BUSTLED onto the screened-in porch, placed the tray on the wooden table next to the swing. “It’s sweetened tea, Gretchen. With fresh mint.” Soft curls framed a sweet, eager face with mild blue eyes and pink cheeks.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Steele.” Gretchen accepted the big glass. She liked tea better without sugar but she took a sip, then another, and the sweet cold drink poured energy into her body. “Barb said you took a lot of her mom’s classes at the gift shop.” She put down the glass, picked up her pencil and the fan of yellow copy paper.

  Sudden tears glistened in Mrs. Steele’s eyes. “Faye was the most alive person I ever knew. She loved painting and teaching people how to do it. I never knew anybody who loved painting as much as she did. . . .”

  GRETCHEN RESTED HER bike against the trunk of the big cottonwood that shaded the back steps of the Blue Light. The back door was open. A radio played Glenn Miller’s “Mood Indigo.” A half dozen cars were parked in front on the beaten-up ground that served as a parking lot. Gretchen didn’t have a clear picture of what went on in a tavern. People drank beer and listened to music and danced, and lots of people in town, like Reverend Byars, wrinkled their faces like prunes when anybody talked about the Blue Light. Gretchen wasn’t sure why she’d come. She’d talked to Mrs. Hopper last fall when she’d tried to get word to Millard that his folks weren’t mad at him anymore. Gretchen remembered a big woman in a purple dress with a dead white face and bushy red hair and tired eyes. She’d brushed Gretchen off, but a few weeks later Millard had written his folks. Maybe . . .

  Gretchen knocked on the screen door. It rattled on its hinges. A sour smell overlain by sizzling onions and hot grease rolled over her. She peered through the screen into a long kitchen. Her nose wrinkled. The dingy room looked dirty; the garbage was overflowing; food-crusted dishes were stacked on an uneven wooden counter. She knocked again.

  “So what’s the damn hurry?” A skinny little woman in a tattered shirt and stained skirt stamped to the door. “Go away, kid. We don’t need whatever—”

  “Mrs. Hopper.” Gretchen lifted her voice. “I need to see Mrs. Hopper.”

  The woman snapped a dish towel at flies buzzing over the dishes. “You selling something?”

  “No. Please. Tell Mrs. Hopper”—Gretchen knew this wasn’t the time to say she was from the Gazette—“that I’m here for Faye Tatum.” A slight breeze rattled the leaves of the cottonwood, but not even the thick blanket of shade lessened the moist heat of the late afternoon. Gretchen’s tongue felt thick she was so thirsty. Even in the shade, the air felt hot as exhaust from a tailpipe.

  “The one that got herself killed?” The bony woman wiped her face with the cloth. Her gnarled hand was soapy. “Lou don’t know nothing about that. I can tell you she don’t want to talk about it.”

  Gretchen almost turned away. Even if Mrs. Hopper would come to the door, she’d likely send Gretchen away. But maybe . . . “Please, go ask her if she liked Faye. If she did, she’ll want to talk to me.”

  The sharp-featured woman shrugged. As her shoes clumped on the wooden floor, Gretchen jumped off the steps onto hard-packed dirt. She hurried to the water faucet that poked from the side of the foundation. She crouched, turned the handle, let warm water slip through her fingers until it cooled, then pooled water into her hands and drank thirstily.

  “Josie”—the voice was deep and explosive—“what kind of game—oh, there she is.” The screen door banged. Lou Hopper stood on the top step, her hands splayed on her hips. Mercurochrome red hair flared in thick curls to the sides of her head. Thin black eyebrows, shiny as tar, arched in half moons above dark eyes cold as a winter pond.

  Gretchen scrambled to her feet. She wiped her hands on her skirt as she moved toward the steps. “Mrs. Hopper, I’m Gretchen Gilman and—”

  “I remember you.” The rough voice was brusque. “Millard’s friend.” Mrs. Hopper pressed her lips together in a tight line.

  Gretchen looked up and their eyes met. Gretchen waited, not moving, knowing that the hard-faced
woman’s silence was a tribute to Millard. For an instant he was there with them, his round face bright with happiness.

  “Goddam war.” Mrs. Hopper jammed her hands in the pockets of her emerald green skirt. She cleared her throat. “Josie said you asked if I liked Faye Tatum. Why?”

  “People are saying a lot of bad things about Mrs. Tatum.” Gretchen looked into cold, empty, remote eyes. “Mostly because she came here to dance. I want to write a story for the Gazette telling people what she was really like. You can help me.”

  Bright red lips twisted. “Gilman . . .” Her eyes glittered like coins tossed on a table. “G. G. Gilman.” She gave a hoot of laughter. “So people’ll think you’re a man.” She lifted her big shoulders in a shrug. “Why not? Why the hell not? It’s always a man’s goddam world, isn’t it? Give ’em hell, kid. I’m all for you. But I don’t talk to cops and I don’t talk to reporters.”

  As the screen door squeaked open, Gretchen called out, “If you liked Faye, why won’t you say so?”

  Mrs. Hopper looked over her shoulder. “I run a beer joint, kid. Who cares what I say? I don’t want to get mixed up in anything. People come here to have a good time. They want to laugh and dance and forget the war. I don’t talk about ’em.”

  “All I want to know is what you thought about Faye Tatum. Everybody says she was a tramp because she came to the Blue Light. If you say that isn’t so—”

  “Like that will make a difference?” Her voice was sharp. “Do you think anybody in town will believe what I say? Or care what I say? Poor Faye. She wasn’t looking for trouble.” Mrs. Hopper let go of the screen, turned to face Gretchen. “All right.” She came down the steps, her face bleak. “I’ll talk to you. About Faye. Nobody else. But funny enough, that won’t be hard. And I don’t give a damn what the blue-noses think. Because you know something, they’re wrong. . . .”

  CLOSED WINDOWS. CLOSED doors. The Tatum house baked in the unrelenting blast of the sun, a hot red ball in the western sky. The crackling dry heat in the shut-up rooms would be suffocating, sickening, stifling. Were the doors locked? Probably. But who would go inside? Maybe Barb’s aunt would stay there when she came up from Texas. But Barb had packed up more clothes this morning, enough clothes for several days. That visit seemed a long time ago.

  Gretchen glanced at the folded copy of the Gazette in the basket of her bike. Every night she proudly carried the paper home, eager for Grandmother to see her stories. She didn’t want to show tonight’s Gazette to Grandmother. Grandmother would read the lead story by Ralph Cooley, saying that Sgt. Clyde Tatum was now believed to be armed and dangerous.

  Gretchen rode slowly, her legs aching with weariness. She was almost past the Crane house when she realized the front door was open. Gretchen slowed, stopped. She looked up the neat walk. Water glistened on the rose bushes in the flower bed by the front porch. Gretchen swung off her bike, leaned it on the kickstand. She’d talked to Lucille who had worked with Faye Tatum and Jim Dan who would be an artist because of her and Mrs. Steele who had learned about art from her and Mrs. Hopper who ran the bar where Faye Tatum had loved to dance. Mrs. Crane had been the nearest neighbor to the Tatums. Mrs. Crane had called the police Tuesday afternoon and started the trouble. No, that wasn’t right. It wasn’t Mrs. Crane’s fault that the Tatums had quarreled. But Mrs. Crane clearly kept an eye on the house next door.

  A ruffled white curtain moved at a front window.

  Faye Tatum’s neighbor . . . Gretchen started up the walk. She wished she wasn’t so tired. She felt burdened not only by fatigue but by too many words and emotions and faces. She had enough now for a good story, but it wouldn’t be complete if she didn’t talk to Mrs. Crane.

  She lifted her hand to knock, but quick footsteps sounded. Mrs. Crane looked through the mesh of the screen door. Permed gray hair in tight curls bristled from her narrow head. Skin sagged from sharp bones. Her mouth drooped as if she’d just said something sad. The brightness of pansy blue eyes was almost startling in the seamed face. She held up the evening paper and pointed at the headline: ARMED AND DANGEROUS. “Gretchen, do you know about this?” She yanked open the door, her movement sharp and jerky. “I was going to come and see you tonight. Since you’re working on the paper, I hoped you could tell me.” She took a deep breath, her words spewing like shelled peas tipped into a pot. “I’m so upset. I wish I’d gone to spend the summer with my daughter in Perry, but I thought I should be here to help with George’s children. Come in and let me get you some iced tea. You sit down and I’ll be right back.”

  As Gretchen stepped inside, she smelled talcum powder, starched cotton, furniture polish, and fresh-cut watermelon. The living room was almost a twin in size to that in the Tatum house, but here everything was fresh and clean, washed and polished, the chintz-upholstered furniture adorned with doilies, the windowpanes sparkling, the curtains crisp as altar linen. The dark walnut dining room table glistened. China and silver shone through the glass of a breakfront. A portion of the kitchen table was visible through an open door. Slices of watermelon on a green pottery platter looked fresh and succulent.

  Gretchen sat on the blue chintz sofa in a pool of summer heat. The electric fan whirred, stirring the air, making it seem cooler for an instant. Mrs. Crane kept on talking as she bustled about the kitchen, her high, tremulous voice slightly breathless. “. . . I’ve felt so bad about Faye but I never thought anything like that would happen. When I called the police, I was frightened for Clyde”—her shoes clattered on the wood floor—“because Faye was out of control. I never heard anything like it in all my life. I’ve never heard anyone scream like that.” She pattered into the living room, placed the tray on the coffee table. She stared at Gretchen. “You look so hot and tired, honey. Here.” She held out the glass, ice clinking, fresh mint poking from the tea. “I brought you some watermelon, too.”

  “Thank you.” Gretchen lifted the glass, welcomed the thickly sweet, bitingly cold tea. The watermelon was sweet, too, and crunchy, Gretchen’s favorite taste of summer.

  “Anyway, my husband, William, I don’t know if you remember him, Gretchen, but he always said to me: Least said, soonest mended. And, oh”—tears welled in her eyes—“I’m so ashamed. If I hadn’t told Penelope—you know her, my sister-in-law Penelope Newton—about seeing that man late at night, maybe none of this would have happened. I should have known that Penelope always tells Ed everything and Ed was at the barbershop . . .”

  The words buzzed like flies swirling over a picnic. Gretchen sipped the tea and pieces of Faye Tatum’s last day clicked into place like clothespins snapping garments to a line.

  “. . . and he’s such a loudmouth, showing off, telling everybody there about a man coming to see Faye with Clyde off in the army. Of course, Ed didn’t know Clyde was right there in Moss Wilson’s chair. I shouldn’t have told Penelope, I know I shouldn’t, but I kept thinking about George and how it would break his heart if Jennie ever fooled with a man. Not that Jennie would do a thing like that. She’s been the best wife and mother a man could ever have and I’ve loved her like she was my own and not just my son’s wife. But thinking about George off in the Pacific, fighting those awful Japs, why it just made me mad at Faye even though before I would have said she was a good woman even if she was an artist. I was thinking about George and Jennie when Penelope came over that afternoon and I told her what I’d seen and how bad I thought it was. Penelope promised not to tell anyone, but she never could keep a thing from Ed. But I swear”—those bright eyes bulged—“I was scared to death Tuesday afternoon when I heard those screams and shouts. I was in the kitchen with the window open”—she gestured toward the back of the house—“and I heard the back door slam and Clyde yell and pretty soon Faye’s voice was shrill and loud, louder than you’d think anybody could be, and she said he was”—Mrs. Crane paused and a pink flush deepened the rose of her cheeks—“anyway, she was saying he was awful, so bad and mean and that it was all a lie and what kind of man was he, to believe that k
ind of garbage about his wife and she’d been so glad he was home and now he’d ruined everything. Clyde yelled that she was a”—another pause—“a bad woman, though that’s not the word he used, and a minute later she shouted she was going to kill him, that she’d get the gun and shoot him dead and show him what happened to liars. That’s when I ran to the phone and called the police. Before Sergeant Petty came—and I don’t think it’s right to have a woman in pants like that, I don’t care if that’s what war workers wear—” She lifted her hand, pressed it to her lips, then cried, “Oh, I’m sorry, Gretchen, I know your mother works at the plant in Tulsa and it’s real important to have people working to make the airplanes and I know she has to dress that way, but Sergeant Petty looks almost like a man and she walks like one, too. But the back door banged and Clyde came out and his face looked like he was trying not to cry, you know how men can look, their faces all bunched up tight like a wild horse pulling on a bit. Anyway, he was gone before the police car got here. I was watching out the window”—she pointed across the room where the curtain had twitched—“and Sergeant Petty went right up to the front door and knocked. There wasn’t any answer. She went around to the back of the house. I was so glad Clyde had already left. I’ll never forget how Faye sounded, screaming that she was going to shoot him dead. When I called the police that’s what I told them . . .”

  Gretchen remembered the wail of the siren as the cruiser pulled out of the dusty lot.

  “. . . and the police car got here real fast but Clyde was gone. In a little while, Sergeant Petty drove off. Now, you being on the paper and all, I thought you would know. How come she didn’t get that gun away from Faye? I told them about the gun.” The tears made her eyes shiny like purple flowers wet with rain.