Temple Secrets: Southern Humorous Fiction: (New for 2015) For Lovers of Southern Authors and Southern Novels (2 page)

An oil portrait of Edward Temple, Iris and Oscar’s only son, glares at Queenie from across the room. Their daughter Rose’s portrait was taken down and stored in the attic twenty-five years before, replaced now by an original Audubon. Queenie keeps in touch with Iris’s estranged daughter, Rose, who lives on a horse and cattle ranch outside Cheyenne, Wyoming. Rose has one child, Katie, who graduated from college and now works in Chicago, and is Iris’s only grandchild, whom she has never met. Queenie pulls a photograph from her pocket that arrived in the morning mail of Rose and Katie in Chicago. She smiles.

“What are you looking at?” Iris asks.

“Nothing, Iris,” Queenie says. She slides the picture back in her pocket. Of all the Temples, Queenie likes Rose best. Yet Iris has forbidden Queenie to ever speak of her. Rose’s existence has been totally erased. No photographs. No memories. Nothing.

Rose was ten years old when Queenie came to live here and Edward was seventeen and away at boarding school. Queenie’s mother—fondly called Old Sally by everyone who knows her—was still working for the Temples then, but would be replaced by Violet in 1980. Violet, Old Sally’s granddaughter, spent a lot of time at the Temple house when she was growing up and was Rose Temple’s best friend.

Queenie glances at her watch and then at Iris’s empty teacup. She always calls her mother after Iris finishes her tea and retires to her bedroom for her morning constitution—a ritual that easily lasts until noon. Queenie would never call her mother in front of Iris, unless she wanted to aggravate her half-sister for the rest of the day. The two women are like fried okra and a dainty watercress sandwich and do not mix.

At one hundred years of age, Queenie’s mother, Old Sally, lives on the coast of southernmost South Carolina in a house she has lived in her entire life. She was born in the year 1900, and has seen a centuries worth of change. Yet Old Sally still practices the family trade of root doctoring and folk magic in the way her Gullah ancestors did. Just yesterday she got a call from someone in New York City who is flying to Savannah to have her work her spells and cure their environmental illness. This kind of thing happens all the time. Queenie has never practiced the family trade. Perhaps it is the Temple blood in her that refuses to participate. But her mother is quite versed in it.

Seconds later, Iris screams and Queenie bolts upright, her book and magazine flying, as Iris’s teacup crashes to pieces on the marbled floor. Queenie has never heard Iris screech and has to admit it is an interesting change from the silent roar of her half-sister’s delicate constitution.

“What is it Iris, what’s wrong?”

Iris’s mouth gapes as though she is reading her own obituary. She points a boney, bejeweled finger at a section in the classifieds, her hand shaking.

Queenie comes to Iris’s side and leans in to read:

FOUND. One Book of Temple Secrets.

First Secret to be revealed tomorrow.

“Sweet Jesus,” Queenie mutters under her breath. “The shit has just hit the fan.”

Iris’s stomach gurgles in ready agreement.

CHAPTER TWO

Violet

As the grandfather clock in the hallway strikes seven, Violet serves dinner in the grand dining room. Miss Temple sits at the head of the elongated table while her Aunt Queenie takes her place at the far end of the mahogany monster Violet has polished so often she now has tennis elbow without ever lifting a racket. Violet and her aunt have always been close. Like sisters almost, though Queenie is seventeen years older.

The evening meal always looks like a BBC mini-series Violet would never watch. Sepia tones surround an efficient servant (that would be her) serving a grand dame and her half-breed sister elaborate meals while standing nearby to meet their every need. The room is lit by a cumbersome chandelier—one she can only reach with a tall ladder when she dusts—that was an original feature of the house before it was converted to electricity a hundred years earlier. Violet can’t imagine what it was like to work here then, yet her ancestors would know. Her grandmother, who people call Old Sally, has told her stories about washing all the clothes and dishes by hand. Violet shudders with the thought.

After she serves Miss Temple her usual bowl of clear broth soup to begin, the meal can easily last a solid hour while her employer grinds every morsel of food to a lifeless pulp in order to aid her uncooperative digestive system. In contrast, Aunt Queenie finishes her meal while it is still hot—a lovely piece of flounder, with rice and mixed vegetables—which Violet makes separately.

While Violet stands stationed at the door, she remembers her youngest daughter Tia’s question to her this morning:

“Mama, when will I have to start working for the Temples?”

Tia is fourteen and the question shocked Violet. As she told Tia, she will never,
ever
, let either of her daughters work as servants. Never. Violet gives her foot a strong tap now to seal the promise. She will be the last of a long line. Her children will never know what her life has been like, and she is glad.
Never,
she tells herself again, standing straighter. If she can save enough to open her own business, she won’t be at this job much longer anyway.

Life is too short to spend it waiting on rich white people
, she thinks. At the same time she is grateful for the job.

When Iris isn’t looking, Violet winks a hello to her Aunt Queenie. In return, Queenie gives a brief nod and hides a smile behind her napkin. Queenie makes the entire situation of waiting on Miss Temple bearable. They are like two soldiers in a foxhole together, their fates linked by a common foe.

Shadows grasp the corners of the room winning out in a tug-of-war with the light. The dark wood of the doors and moldings adds a veil of heaviness to the room. Period furniture, heralding the time the house was constructed, gleam with over a century’s worth of lemon oil rubbed into the grain by her ancestors, and now by Violet. History, in this house, is as heavy as the curtains that cover the floor to ceiling windows. Every day, Violet yearns to throw open the curtains and let some fresh air into the rooms. She is convinced air from the last century is still trapped in the corners.

As far as she knows, Miss Temple is the only member of Savannah’s upper class who still insists that they dress for dinner. Violet is also the only housekeeper and cook still required, even in the year 2000, to wear a blue uniform with a starched white apron on top and white shoes. A look meant to remind Violet of her place and perhaps the 1940s. As Violet has observed, things are slow to change in the Temple household.

However, on this particular evening, Miss Temple has not changed from the clothes she wore that morning when Violet cleaned up the spilled tea in the sunroom. Something from the newspaper had Miss Temple practically in tears. Not that Violet has ever seen her employer cry. Violet isn’t that fond of crying, either, but at least she knows she can do it when a situation warrants. Yet Miss Temple’s lack of dinner etiquette strikes her as odd.

Violet lifts an eyebrow to ask Queenie
what’s up.

Queenie shrugs and widens her eyes with the message to stay alert.

No one speaks during meals—another of Miss Temple’s dinner rules—so Violet is left to listen to the old grandfather clock ticking away the seconds of her life and the click, click, clicks of silver on china, along with Miss Temple’s persistent chewing, accompanied by guttural noises and the occasional passing of gas. As her husband, Jack, likes to say:
Iris Temple passes gas like a 300 pound Georgia Bulldog after a chili cook off.
She resists smiling.

Violet pulls a small tincture bottle of vanilla, cinnamon and ginger root from the pocket of her apron to dab underneath her nose. A scent, oddly enough, Miss Temple never notices. The tincture is the only thing Violet has been able to find to counteract the smell of the potent exotic meats and Miss Temple’s inevitable reaction to them.

Tonight’s reactions are more forceful than usual. Perhaps because of what was in the newspaper this morning. Before the first course is finished, Miss Temple leans and lifts her hip three times. Another gesture found more often at a Bulldogs game than one of Savannah’s most prominent families.

It remains a mystery what causes Miss Temple’s ailments. No matter how many specialists she sees or what radical changes she makes to her diet, her condition does not improve, making Violet believe that it is entirely possible that her grandmother deserves more credit.

“Are you reading during dinner?” Miss Temples barks at Queenie, as if she’s caught her buying sweatpants at Wal-Mart.

Violet snaps to attention.

“Answer me,” she insists. If Violet had the nerve, she would tell Miss Temple to quit being such a bully. But, for now, she can’t risk losing her job. Besides, Queenie knows how to take care of herself.

“If you must know, Iris, I was praying,” Queenie says.

Miss Temple pauses as if aware that even she can’t trump God.

“No need to worry, Iris, I’ll put in a good word for you.” Queenie glances heavenward, whispers a few words and then winks at Violet.

In response, Miss Temple’s stomach rumbles like a thunderclap and her body leans. Anticipating what’s next, Violet dabs another application of her tincture to her upper lip. Over the years, Violet has become as adept at reading Miss Temple’s dark moods as the experts on the weather channel are at predicting hurricanes. In the current forecast, her employer’s stormy disposition has changed from a watch to a warning.

Miss Temple coaxes into her mouth a piece of rattlesnake that Violet sautéed in butter and onions. In the last decade, she has learned to cook things she would have never dreamed would end up in her kitchen. Miss Temple chews with so much vigor it makes Violet’s jaws hurt. Her Gullah ancestors would much sooner run from a snake than to eat one. When Violet was a girl her grandmother told her stories about whip snakes, which were said to bite their tails and roll like a wheel in order to overcome their victims. At that moment, she pines for her grandmother’s stories, as well as her red rice, okra soup, and shrimp and grits. She has come a long way from her Gullah roots, though she’s not so certain this is a good thing.

No one expected Miss Temple to live this long. A delicate constitution has plagued her since before Violet started working here and has intensified over the years. Meanwhile, Miss Temple’s face takes on the color of a confederate gray uniform worn by one of her ancestors in the portrait gallery. Violet is smart enough to fear what is coming, but luckily it doesn’t seem to be about the food.

“I was at my attorney’s office today trying to sue the newspaper when I received some alarming news of a different nature,” Miss Temple says.

Violet and her aunt exchange quick looks.

“Sometimes those closest to us betray us,” Miss Temple says, sounding like a Hallmark greeting card gone wrong. Her eyes narrow and change from tired blue to a steel gray. A pause follows, the distance between lightning and a thunderclap.

Violet fears for Queenie more than herself. Miss Temple can be spiteful when she wants to be, especially to Queenie.

“It seems my attorney has found a most distressing letter,” Miss Temple says.

“A letter?” Queenie asks, appearing calm. “From whom?” Both Violet and Queenie know it is safer not to react.

Miss Temple tightens her lips and then wipes her mouth on a silk napkin graced with a prominent monogrammed “T” in gold thread that Violet has laundered and ironed hundreds of times.

“Did everyone know except me?” Miss Temple asks Queenie and then turns the question toward Violet, who takes a step back. It is not like Miss Temple to notice her.

“I’ve fought my entire life for the recognition I deserve,” Miss Temple begins again. “My father would have much preferred his only child be a son. It doesn’t matter that I’ve solidified the Temple dynasty during my tenure.”

Violet has never heard the Temple matriarch talk like this. Does it have anything to do with the threat in the newspaper this morning? Something to do with the secrets?

“Are you okay, Iris?” Queenie asks, as if she, too, has noticed the change.

“I’ve been thinking about the past more than usual, that’s all,” she answers. “Nothing good can come of it, of course. It’s probably because of those damn secrets.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Queenie asks.

Miss Temple’s eyes widen like confiding in Queenie is about as appealing as desegregation. “Must you be so common,” she says to Queenie, her words coming out in a huff. “Of course I don’t want to talk about it, especially not with someone who isn’t a
true
Temple. How could you possibly understand?” She sighs, as though putting Queenie in her place isn’t as satisfying as she hoped.

Violet hates it when Miss Temple takes out her frustration on her aunt and she opens her mouth to tell her so, but Queenie shakes her head to stop her.

“My father was a brilliant man except for sleeping with the servants,” Miss Temple begins again. “But I have to put up with you as a constant reminder of his indiscretions. Have you ever thought about what it’s like for me to deal with my father’s bastard child for over half a century?”

Violet steps closer to defend Queenie, but Queenie shakes her head again. In most cases it’s best to just let Miss Temple’s rants play out, like letting a tea kettle release its steam. It doesn’t help that someone is threatening to leak secrets to the newspaper, however this latest news seems to have distracted her from even that.

“Of course it was Oscar’s idea,” Miss Temple continues. “He could be quite persuasive when he wanted to be.” She rubs her temples as though smoothing a splitting headache. “Did I ever tell you that I married him just to make my mother angry? He was from a family of tailors.” Iris gives a short laugh. “
Beneath us
, my mother said.”

Violet always wondered how Mister Oscar ended up with Miss Temple. He seemed way too nice for her.

According to Queenie, Miss Temple treated his parents horribly. They were never invited to Temple events, and she didn’t even attend their funerals. To Violet, family is sacred. Having never known her parents, she doesn’t take family for granted.