miss fortune mystery (ff) - jewel of the bayou (3 page)

“Don’t blame me! If there had been a decent loaner, this never would have happened. I don’t know why you think that I’m always at fault, when it’s clear as day that…”

I let the two of them bicker, smoothed my Sunday dress, and regained my composure.

“What I meant to say,” I paused for a moment, and took a breath. “What I meant to say was ‘thank you’”. I looked him square in the eye, and tried out a smile.

“No problem,” he said, and I noticed a glint in those gorgeous blue eyes. “Just happened to be in the right place at the right time. How’s the food in there, anyway?”

“In the café?” I said, and swiftly gave myself a mental kick. Of course in the café. “Great! Outstanding. Just the thing!”

The corners of his mouth began to twitch, and I could see another grin coming on.

“That’s my opinion, anyway,” I said. “But I’ll stand by it. After all, if you want an expert opinion of food, I’m your girl.”

“We’ll see about that,” he said. “As long as there’s plenty of it, though, I’ll be happy. You can take the football player off the field, but you’ll never get him away from the table.”

“Football, huh?” I said.

“High school only,” he replied. “Not enough bulk to go on in college.”

From where I was standing, his bulk looked pretty amazing. I would have let it go on in college.

I noticed the silence behind me, and turned back to the pickup truck, where both Gertie and Ida Belle were staring at me without any subtlety at all.

“Where are my manners?” I said with a smile that I trusted looked sincere. “Ida Belle, Gertie, I’d like you to meet Jack.”

“We already met,” Gertie said. “In church. This morning.”

“That’s right. You’re the poor guy who has to take all our pictures without breaking the lens,” Ida Belle said, and then she shot me another one of her patented looks. “Though I’m a little surprised the two of you have already met,” she said under her breath.

“Then it doesn’t take much to surprise you,” I said out of the side of my mouth, and turned again to Jack with a smile. “Anyway, don’t let us keep you, Jack.”

Gertie was cranking the engine as I was speaking, and Jack held out a hand to help me back into the cab. I took it, and settled myself in with as much dignity as possible as he slammed the door after me, choking me in yet another cloud of dust.

“See ya later, alligator!” Gertie shouted, and with a roar we were off. I could see Jack in the rear view mirror, one hand lifted in farewell, and that darn grin on his face.

“You want to watch out for those football players,” Ida Belle said. “Too much glory, too young. It goes to their heads.”

She shook her own head of white hair.

“Not that it takes a lot to puff up a man,” she continued. “Buncha idiots, mostly.”

“Mostly,” Gertie agreed, and we headed on down the road.

Chapter Four

We rumbled down the oak allée to the Langstrom house, Spanish moss blowing above us in the breeze, and Gertie pulled up in front of the porch and slammed on the brakes. The engine choked and died with a loud bang as it gave a final backfire, and the truck jerked to a stop. It didn’t take a small explosion to get Mrs. Langstrom’s attention, though. I imagined she had been keeping an eye on us from the moment we had turned off the main road, and the twitch of a curtain confirmed my opinion. She was well aware that we were there.

“I’d better go in first,” I said.

“Nonsense,’ said Ida Belle. “Gertie will go with you.”

“Oh she will, will she!” Gertie said as she opened her door and stepped out. “We’re all going. You’ve come along this far, Ida Belle. No backing out now.”

“That’ll teach me to get into a pickup truck with you,” Ida Belle said.

“If you haven’t learned that lesson by now, you never will,” Gertie said. “Now come on!”

We all trooped up to the rambling Victorian like girl scouts selling cookies, and I tapped on the door before opening it and going inside.

“I’m back, Mrs. Langstrom! And these lovely ladies were nice enough to give me a ride.”

There was a moment of silence, and then a soft thud as the door to the parlor was thrown open, hitting the heavy velvet curtain draped behind it. Mrs. Langstrom had made her entrance.

“These ladies weren’t lovely back when they were young enough to have a chance to pass it off, and there’s no reason on God’s green earth to think they’re lovely now.”

“It’s great to see you, too, Gladys,” Gertie said. “Good to see you’re still yourself.”

“And who else would I be?”

“Now that’s a question,” Ida Belle said.

“But we’re not here to dredge up old memories,” Gertie smoothly went on. “We’re here because Lindy seemed confused about who’s who at church, and we want to make sure that she gets the latest copy of the Church Directory. Of course, she asked when you would be getting your picture taken, and we realized that we just weren’t sure about that. So I figured we should give Lindy here a ride back, and take the opportunity to see when you’ll be able to come in to town for your portrait session.”

This was all news to me, and I was in awe. Full frontal assault seemed to be Gertie’s mode of operation, but if anything was going to take down Mrs. Langstrom’s defenses, it would probably have to be something along those lines.

“Portrait session!” she scoffed. “Why, the church can keep using the same picture they’ve been using for years. I have no problem with that.”

She touched her hair as she spoke, and straightened up as if she were already sitting for her portrait. Gertie and Ida Belle were right – she was a tiny bit vain.

“I imagine they would, but it’s all whatchacallit, digital, something. Anyway, they can’t use the photos they used in the past. Not anymore.”

“Hmmph,” was her only reply, but she seemed to be thinking. Her first line of defenses had been breached, and it looked like Gertie thought it was time to use the big guns.

“I know the folks at church sure would hate to leave the space for your picture blank. Heck, the way they do things now, they would probably put in a drawing of an alligator or something, just to spice things up. No telling what people will think is funny these days.”

I heard Ida Belle snort, and I have to admit that the thought of an alligator representing Mrs. Langstrom wouldn’t be totally inappropriate.

“Anyway,” Gertie continued, “you know you do have a reputation.”

I saw that Mrs. Langstrom didn’t much like to hear that. Her eyes narrowed, and she opened her mouth to speak, but Gertie cut her off.

“For best dressed, you know. You always did have flair, Gladys, no matter what anyone said.” She elbowed Ida Belle in the ribs as she said that, which might have been a good idea. The look of surprise on Ida Belle’s face was unmistakable.

“Best dressed?” Mrs. Langstrom said. “Well, I don’t know about that.”

Gertie just smiled, and Ida Belle took the opportunity to join in.

“Right. Let’s not go overboard, now.”

That got her another nudge in the ribs from Gertie.

“I’ll bet you never knew that, did you, Lindy,” Gertie said. “Gladys here could really put on a show. And really, Gladys, I have to say that it’s your duty as a Christian and a Baptist to show these girls today how it’s done. Remind folks who you are. Prove you’re not a heathen.”

Ida Belle snorted again, and dodged the elbow that came flying her way.

Mrs. Langstrom seemed to be thinking things over, and I started to get my hopes up. After all, if she did get out of the house now and then, I’d have a chance to get out, too. With a little luck, she’d be joining the choir or something, and I’d have an evening off once in a while.

“You may be right, Gertie,” she said, “and you know I don’t say that lightly.” She pointed a finger at Ida Belle. “As for you, Ida Belle, if you think you’ll ever live long enough to hear me say that you’re right about anything at all, you’ve got another thing coming. And, frankly, I’m surprised to see you taking an interest in things like this. I would think you would have given up on getting your own portrait taken, old as you are.”

“Old enough to know better than to stuff an old goat into lambswool,” Ida Belle said.

“I don’t even want to know what you think you mean by that,” Mrs. Langstrom said, “but it appears to me that things haven’t changed much since I saw you last. I imagine things have gone to you-know-where in a handbasket around the church since I became sickly.” She paused and gave a delicate cough. “You, Lindy, go get me a glass of water.”

“Yes, ma’am!” I said, and I headed to the kitchen.

“Sickly!” I heard Ida Belle’s voice clear as a bell as I was running water into a glass. It carried.

“Yes, sickly,” Mrs. Langstrom was saying as I returned. “But not so far gone as to avoid my duty. You just let them know that I’ll be coming by tomorrow evening to sit for my portrait.”

Having seen Jack lying on the floor plugging in cords and trying to turn that dark old sanctuary into something appropriate for taking pictures that wouldn’t look too much like mug shots, I was afraid that Mrs. Langstrom might be disappointed with her experience tomorrow. But the important thing was to get her out of the house, and back into the church. I imagined that Gertie and Ida Belle would be able to take it from there.

“Well, that’s fine,” Gertie said, and she turned toward the door as Mrs. Langstrom took a sip of water and then handed the glass back to me without bothering to look to make sure that I was there to grab it. Of course, I was. “I’m sure we’ll all look forward to seeing you then.”

“Yes,” Mrs. Langstrom said, almost to herself. “I’ll need to think about what to wear. Of course, I’ll wear mother’s bloodstone. I think that people would expect it.”

“Bloodstone?” I repeated, and Ida Belle groaned.

“That stone,” she said. “Don’t get her started. Come on, Gertie. Haul me back to town. I’ve got things I need to get done.”

“Yes, mother’s bloodstone,” Mrs. Langstrom said, and she both looked at me and looked through me. “It’s just such a striking piece. Mother was a debutante in New Orleans, you know, and it was a gift from her father when she came out. Goodness! It made such a stir at the time. The papers really covered society in those days. Truly, I can feel the years long gone by when I wear that piece. Why, one time…”

“Gertie!” Ida Belle was at the door, and almost shouting. “Get a move on! We need to leave before she takes that damn stone out, and makes us all admire it.”

“Good-bye, Gladys,” Gertie said, and she followed Ida Belle out the door. “We’ll see you tomorrow!”

“That stone,” Mrs. Langstrom said in a faraway voice, and then she turned to me. “Get me my wrap. I’m feeling chill. And then go put on some tea. I need to think.”

I headed to the parlor, doing some thinking of my own about my Sinful Sunday.

Chapter Five

Another day, another crazy driver. Clearly it was time to insist on doing the driving myself. Maybe it’s something in the water, maybe it’s something about whoever taught them to drive, but when the people in this town get behind a wheel they get plain batty.

Mrs. Langstrom had purchased her Oldsmobile back in the good ol’ days, and she’d somehow kept it in pristine condition in a tumbledown carriage house back toward the bayou. A layer of dust showed that it hadn’t been driven in a while, but apparently someone come by every so often to start it up and rotate the tires and check the oil, and it was in good running condition.

Much better condition than Mrs. Langstrom’s driving skills.

When she had said that she would be coming into town for her portrait, I had assumed that she would be making a quick afternoon trip of it. But what is it they say happens when you ‘assume’? I should have known. If there was a chance to make a production out of something, Mrs. Langstrom wouldn’t let the opportunity pass her by.

“The golden hour is the most important thing, Lindy,” she’d said that morning. “There’s just something about the light as the sun is about to set that makes everything magical. That’s the time to sit for a portrait. When the light is at its best.”

I spent most of the day going through her closets, grabbing outfits that she thought would work, and putting them back almost as soon as I had taken them out. Finally she settled on a high-necked polyester dress in a brassy shade of bronze. I’m not sure that it would put her on the best dressed list in most places, but Sinful isn’t your usual sort of town.

Finally dressed, primped, and ready to go, we got into the Olds and hit the road.

We very, very slowly hit the road.

I hadn’t set any land speed records when I had walked to church the day before, but I don’t think there’s any doubt that I could have outpaced Mrs. Langstrom. “Better safe than sorry,” she said as we crept along, and she may have felt safe, but I was beginning to feel sorry.

Fortunately, there’s not enough traffic in Sinful to do more than give you a reason to wave from your porch now and then, so it wasn’t as if we were holding things up by going so slowly. A nice older gentleman came up behind us on a horse at one point, but he didn’t seem at all surprised by Mrs. Langstrom’s pace. He just tipped his hat to us, and rode on by. And not at a gallop, either.

“Close call!” Mrs. Langstrom said. “I thought he was going to pull us over, and give us a ticket, didn’t you?”

“A ticket?”

“Yes! That’s the sheriff, you know.”

“The sheriff?”

“Honestly, girl, are you hard of hearing? Yes, the sheriff. Robert E. Lee, no relation.”

“And the sheriff rides a horse while he’s on duty.”

“Well, you may be deaf, but at least you aren’t blind. Now be quiet. I have to concentrate.”

We crept on down the road, and finally I saw the church come into view. Closer, closer, and then we were pulling up in front of the building, right behind Gertie’s pickup truck.

I felt the crunch more than I heard it. Just a hesitation, as the Olds rolled into place behind Gertie and crumpled the corner of her bumper. I closed my eyes for a moment, pulled myself out of the car, and found myself in front of a greeting committee composed of Gertie, Ida Bell, Deacon Ryan, and Jack.