by Ann B. Ross
“Don’t make no difference to me. But you gonna get yo’ nose stuck so high up in the air, you won’t see what right in front of yo’ face, you don’t watch out.”
Continuing to grumble under her breath, she banged a pan on the stove, and Hazel Marie and I left to start making our phone calls. For the first time I saw the sense in Hazel Marie having her own line, when all the time before I’d thought it was an unnecessary expense just to be able to talk to Mr. Pickens in private.
* * *
“Well, Lillian,” I said, pushing through the swinging door into the kitchen a little while later. “I hope you’re happy. I’ve invited Sam, and a good thing, too, because Coleman has asked him to be the best man. So now we’ll have an uneven number at the table because I want Little Lloyd, too. Let’s put the boy opposite me at the foot of the table. Binkie on my right and Coleman on my left, since they’re the guests of honor. Then Hazel Marie and Mr. Pickens opposite each other in the middle. Sam can sit on Little Lloyd’s right, opposite nobody.”
“Guess that’ll fix him,” she said, half under her breath. “If he notice.”
“Don’t give me a hard time, Lillian. That man’s made my life a misery lately, blowing hot and cold like he’s been doing. Now, what’re we going to serve?”
“I already took that tenderloin roast outta the freezer.”
“That’ll be good. Let’s do oven-roasted new potatoes, and see if you can find fresh asparagus; call Mr. Wheeler’s store and have it delivered. If you can’t get fresh, get the canned and make that casserole with the cheese on top. A nice salad and some of your yeast rolls. And whatever you feel like making for dessert. You know I don’t eat dessert, so whatever you want will be fine. The men will love anything you fix.”
“What about that lemon chiffon pie what Coleman like so much?”
“Perfect. I might even have a small piece myself.”
* * *
Hazel Marie, in her downstairs bedroom, and I, on the upstairs line, spent the morning hours on the telephone issuing invitations. In between calls to guests, I managed to line up the florist, the caterer and a rented piano. On top of that, I spent futile time looking for someone whose piano playing was better known to me than Lillian’s friend from the AME Zion church. Half the people we called were not in or closed on Saturday. I declare, planning a wedding was a lot more involved than planning a tea, which I could’ve done in my sleep.
On my way downstairs, I looked in on Hazel Marie. She was talking on the phone to someone, so she waved happily at me as I went on to the kitchen.
“Lillian,” I said, “where’s Little Lloyd?”
“He settin’ on the back steps ruinin’ his eyes with that Gametoy.”
“Boy,” I said.
She glanced at me, frowning. “What boy?”
“Game Boy, not toy.” I opened the screen door. “Little Lloyd, I have a job for you, if you don’t mind.”
“No’m, I don’t mind.”
“I want you to take the hose and wash off the front porch, the front walk and the driveway. There’s brick dust and plaster dust and every other kind of dust everywhere you look from that construction site. Hose off as much of it as you can, and give the boxwoods a good spraying. They’re coated with it, too. We want it all looking nice for our guests tonight.”
He got up from the steps and put his Game Boy in his pocket. “It sure does need it. And I better weed the flower beds some, too.” He cut his eyes at me and grinned. “That’s what I get the big money for, isn’t it?”
“Your allowance is plenty adequate, you little rascal,” I said, smiling back. “But, Little Lloyd, stay in the yard. Your mother’ll worry about you if you wander off.”
And I would, too. Not that I was concerned about Dixon Hightower, who was probably already back behind bars, but I always felt better when I knew where the child was.
As he got the hose from the garage, I went back in to set the dining room table for Lillian. Before I got out of the kitchen, though, Hazel Marie came running in.
“Miss Julia, guess what!”
I’d never seen her so excited, so I guessed: “Mr. Pickens wants to get married!”
“Oh!” She had a momentary drop in her excitement level, but it didn’t last long. “No, that’s not it, but I just talked to Binkie. You know, just to be sure that J.D.’ll be here tonight. And he will, but she said she was about to call me. Miss Julia, you won’t believe this, but she wants me to be her bridesmaid! Should I do it, Miss Julia? What do you think?”
I couldn’t bring myself to say what I really thought, which was that Binkie was headstrong and gave little or no thought to how things would look. So I mentally bit my lip and said, “Why, of course you should and I think it’s fine.”
Hazel Marie was all of forty and maybe a little more, to say nothing of the fact that she hardly qualified as a maid. If that meant what I thought it did.
“Well, see,” Hazel Marie said, “I thought she maybe ought to ask somebody she’s known longer. You know, one of her college friends or someone she works with.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that, Hazel Marie. She wouldn’t’ve asked you if she hadn’t wanted you. Who else is she asking?”
“Just me! And Coleman’ll have Sam to stand up for him. Oh, this is so exciting! What do I wear? What does a bridesmaid do? I’ve never been one before.”
Hazel Marie looked for all the world like one of those skinny little models, except for being uncommonly large above the waist. I thought to myself that all my lessons on hair treatment and correct attire had taken root and grown. Although some of them had grown in directions I was unprepared for, like hemlines halfway to Christmas. But she was as pretty as she could be, and if Mr. Pickens could’ve seen her in her present state, he would’ve married her in a minute.
“Binkie’ll decide on your dress. Lord, I hope she’ll have time to do at least that. All you have to do is get it fitted if it needs it. As for what you do, we’d better get out Miss Vanderbilt’s etiquette book so we don’t forget anything. Ordinarily, the bridesmaids give a party for the bride, but there’s no time for that. Let’s see, I think they help her dress for the ceremony, and just be available for whatever she needs.”
“I’m just so excited. But, Miss Julia,” she said, leaning close with a frown on her face. “You don’t think I’m too old, do you? I mean, to be a bridesmaid? That just means somebody who’s never been married, doesn’t it? And I haven’t but, well, there’s Little Lloyd, does he count?”
It took all I could do to keep from rolling my eyes. Of course he counted, but if you wanted to be legalistic about it then maid did mean unmarried and that’s what she was and might continue to be. Unfortunately.
“Times change, Hazel Marie, and we have to change with them. This wedding’s going to be one of a kind already. So I say let’s do what Binkie wants, within reason, of course, and she wants you.”
“Oh, that’s such a relief,” she said. “You always know the right thing to do, and I so wanted you to say it was all right. I’m so thrilled I don’t know what to do. Oh, I know, I’ll ask Binkie to go to lunch next week. That’d be a correct thing to do, wouldn’t it, Miss Julia?”
“Perfectly correct and a lovely thought. You can offer to run errands for her or do whatever she needs doing.”
“Oh, this is wonderful!” She ran over and gave me a less-than-welcome hug. Being around Mr. Pickens so much was making her more demonstrative than I was accustomed to.
Then she headed for the door. “I can’t wait to tell J.D.; maybe I can reach him on his car phone. This is going to be so much fun!”
When the door closed behind her, I sank down into a chair and sighed. “Lillian,” I said, “there went the oldest living bridesmaid, and thrilled to death about it.”
“You jus’ let her have her enjoys, an’ don’t say nothin’ to bring her down.”
“Have I said anything?” I demanded. “All I’m trying to do is keep this wedding within the bounds of p
ropriety.”
“I don’t know ’bout no bounds. Le’s jus’ get Coleman and Miss Binkie married an’ worry ’bout bounds later on.”
“That’s exactly what I intend to do. I declare, Lillian, have you ever heard of so many people living together without benefit of marriage, just as bold and brazen as they can be? I really think I’m doing my civic duty, to say nothing of my spiritual duty, to get those two publicly married so everybody in town will know it. And as for Hazel Marie, well, she and Mr. Pickens know how I feel about their situation. But they’ve both been burned before, so I’m trying to understand that they want to try it out first.
“But I’ll tell you this,” I went on. “If everybody tried it out first, there’d be a lot fewer marriages in the world.”
Lillian laughed, nodding her head. “Yessum, and if I’d knowed what I was gettin’ into, I’d a never got into it.”
“Well, at least she can be a part of Binkie’s wedding and that may do her and Mr. Pickens some good. Maybe they’ll see what they’re missing. Oh, my goodness,” I said, looking at the clock. “I’ve got to call Emma Sue Ledbetter. That child’ll worry himself to death until I get that meeting straightened out.”
* * *
Emma Sue answered her phone with a questioning “Hello?”, like she wasn’t sure anybody’d be on the other end.
“Emma Sue, this is Julia Springer, and I’m calling to tell you that Little Lloyd won’t be at your meeting today. He’s needed here at home.”
She sighed in that martyred way of hers. “You’re the fifth person this morning to cancel out. I guess I’ll just have to call it off.”
“That’s too bad,” I said, not meaning it at all. “But maybe that tells you something about having it on Saturday.”
“I don’t know, Julia,” she said in a soft whine. “I try so hard, you just don’t know how hard I try, and people let any little incident get in the way of the Lord’s work. Why, for example, I’ve misplaced my favorite tortoiseshell hairbrush, can’t find it anywhere and I’ve looked this house over for it. Put it on your prayer list, Julia, if you will.” She paused to gather herself, while I tightened my grip on the telephone. “I know a lot of people would let something like that distract them from their daily walk, but I just make it a matter of prayer.”
“Good for you, Emma Sue,” I said, anxious to distract her from the subject of praying, which she didn’t think I did enough of. But what did she know? Just because I didn’t talk about it all the time, much less air my business for the titillation of the prayer chain, didn’t mean I wasn’t doing my share of it. “But what does a hairbrush have to do with anything?”
“Well, it’s just an example of how we let little things divert us from our main business. And another example is the fact that everybody’s scared to death of Dixon Hightower when they ought to be trusting in the Lord. That’s why they’re keeping their children home, and that’s what I know you’re doing, too, Julia. Well.” She sighed. “I guess I can’t blame you, but it’s setting a bad example for the children and, who knows, maybe starting a dozen more Dixon Hightowers on their way.”
“Oh,” I said, waving my hand even though she couldn’t see it. “That’s most unlikely, Emma Sue. Besides, I couldn’t give a flip for Dixon Hightower; if he’s not back in jail by now, he’s hiding in the woods or, most likely, he’s up in the mountains where he’ll stay until the snows come.”
“I don’t worry about him, either, because my trust is in the Lord. But I guess I can’t expect everybody to be like me.” She sighed again, like she’d all but given up on the human race, and I had to struggle to keep from giving in and sending Little Lloyd to her meeting.
Before I could assure her that she wasn’t alone in her faith, she sniffed and blew her nose. Oh, Lord, I thought, she’s going to start clouding up, which she did whenever anybody in the congregation disappointed her.
She sniffed again and murmured, “I was really counting on Lloyd being there. He could be a leader, I know he could, if he’d buckle down, and our little group could be just the thing to bring him out.”
I sat up so straight I almost pulled my back out. Emma Sue was a fine one to be making critical comments about how any child was raised.
“Little Lloyd’s already been brought out as far as he needs to be, Emma Sue. Now, he’ll try to be at your next meeting and, if he likes it, we’ll send him every time.”
“Oh, Julia.” And I had to wait while she fought her disappointment in me, swallowing a sob as she did so. “You can’t let a child decide what’s right on the basis of whether he likes it or not. You have to tell him what to do and see that he does it. Of course,” she said, “you wouldn’t know that, since you’ve never had any children of your own, would you?”
I got off the phone after that little jab as soon as I could, so mad I could’ve spit nails. There she was, telling me how to raise a child when her own were walking examples of how not to. Her two boys were grown by now, one off in Los Angeles somewhere looking for himself, and you know what that means. And the other, the last I heard, was working for the Democratic Party in Washington, D.C., which in the eyes of the pastor and Emma Sue was worse than being in California.
Chapter 7
It’s a settled fact that when you have more than enough to fill your day, something unexpected will come knocking at your door. Or in this case ringing your telephone. I had just put the phone down after making several more calls to extend invitations to the wedding, when it rang under my hand.
“Mrs. Springer?” It was a voice that I didn’t at first recognize, but she went on to firmly and forcefully identify herself. “This is Etta Mae Wiggins. You know, I was Mr. Sam Murdoch’s home nurse that time he broke his leg? And I rent a space from you in the Hillandale Trailer Park? Well, I’m calling to let you know that we’re having some trouble out here.”
I was silent for a minute, trying to place the Hillandale Trailer Park. I had no trouble placing Etta Mae Wiggins. Her image immediately flew into my mind, and I just as immediately was on my guard. Yes, I remembered the small, curlyheaded, dyed-blond little snip; the one who was all over Sam pretending to take care of him, and the one with the checkered marital history. And some even more garish unmarital history, as well, if the tales told around town were true.
The trailer park was another matter. I had vague recollections of the list of properties that Wesley Lloyd had owned, none of which I’d known about until he was dead and gone. I’d been amazed at the number and variety of businesses that he’d invested in: convenience stores, gas stations, an office building, retail buildings, a car wash, untold numbers of undeveloped acres and yes, a couple of trailer parks. He’d never said a word to me about any of them because, I later learned, he didn’t run them, just collected rent. Which I still did, although it all came to Binkie’s office through Mr. Willis Carter, my so-called properties manager. He was supposed to handle these matters, because I didn’t want to be bothered with them.
So why was this woman calling me about trouble out there?
“Ah, yes, Miss Wiggins,” I said. “I believe you want to get in touch with Mr. Carter. He manages things for me, and he’ll know how to take care of any problems you might have.”
“I’ve tried that, Mrs. Springer, and I can’t find him. In fact, we can never find him unless somebody hasn’t paid their rent on time, then he finds us. I’ve also called the sheriff’s department, and I might as well not’ve found them, either, because they haven’t done a thing.”
“The sheriff’s department! What on earth made you call the sheriff?”
“There’s a thief out here! I tell you, Mrs. Springer, something has to be done.” The woman’s voice was getting more heated by the minute.
“You mean somebody living there is a thief? Why, I’ll have him evicted first thing Monday. Who is it?”
“No, ma’am, it’s not anybody living here. At least, we don’t think so, since everybody’s been here for so long and this has just started.” S
he’d calmed down by this time, but I could hear the concern in her voice. Still, she had a nerve calling me over something even the sheriff couldn’t handle.
“Well,” I said, “if you don’t know who it is, what can I do about it?”
I heard her take a deep breath, then she said, “I would think that, as the owner of this place, you’d want to take some measures to increase security. The pole lights’re out all the time, so that it’s pitch-black at night. There’s no fencing anywhere, so that anybody can come in anytime they want to from any direction. Why, when I have to go out at night to see one of my patients, I never know who’s going to be hiding in the bushes. It’s dangerous out here, Mrs. Springer, and, well, we need something done about it.”
“I’ll have Mr. Carter replace the lights as soon as I can reach him, and I’ll tell him to keep them in good repair. But, as far as a fence is concerned, Miss Wiggins, I believe there’re several acres out there. Do you know what it’d cost to enclose all that?”
“Mrs. Springer,” she said, and I could hear her voice getting tighter. “I just know that everybody out here has had things stolen from them, and I know that sooner or later somebody’s going to get hurt. And a lawsuit against you would cost more than any fence, I don’t care how many acres it went around.”
“A lawsuit! Young lady, are you threatening me?”
“No, ma’am, I’m not. I’m just passing on what I’ve heard others say who live here. Just come out here, Mrs. Springer, and see what we have to put up with.”
“All right, I will,” I said, determined to stop this little matter in its tracks. Just nip it in the bud, before she disrupted my already busy week with more phone calls. “I’ll come right now, even though I have my hands more than full here. How will I find you?”
She gave me directions to her trailer, and I put the phone down with a trembling hand. A lawsuit! I declare, everybody and his brother was suing people right and left. But, to sue me? The idea of being threatened with civil action made my blood boil. Mr. Carter had a lot to answer for, and believe you me, I intended to see that he did.
