The Darling Dahlias and the Silver Dollar Bush (11 page)

But either way, both ways,
that
was what she mourned.

Lizzy took a breath, and then another, nearly overwhelmed, not by what she had heard but by her new understanding. Did this—feeling sorry for Grady but not for herself—mean that she had not truly loved him?

Or did it mean that she had loved him so much that she wanted only his happiness and well-being above all else, with no thought of her own?

But she couldn’t begin to answer those questions—at least, not now.

“I’m sorry, too,” she said. “So sorry, Grady.” She reached across the empty space between them for his hand.
Sorry for you
was what
she meant, but she didn’t say that.

He took her other hand then, and they sat, linked across the widening emptiness, two continents pulling apart, while the April twilight deepened outside the window and a mourning dove called sadly out of the shadows of the sycamore tree in the corner of Lizzy’s front yard.

And then Grady dropped her hands. He stood and kissed her gently on the forehead and left.

He didn’t say good-bye.

Twyla Sue Spreads the News

Tuesday, April 11

The announcement of Grady Alexander’s impending marriage sped around Darling as fast as a wildfire on a hot, windy day. And as might have been expected, Grady’s mother stayed indoors with the blinds down and a cold compress on her forehead, refusing to speak of the wedding even to friends. Liz’s mother had nothing to say, either. She wasn’t answering the telephone.

Since the bride-to-be lived more than twenty miles away, the news would not ordinarily have traveled through Darling with such an incendiary rapidity. But it happened that Sandra Mann’s uncle, Archie Mann, owned and operated Mann’s Mercantile, on the Darling courthouse square. Her aunt by marriage, Twyla Sue Mann, was a prominent Darling resident. Twyla Sue was understandably proud of Sandra for landing as fine a catch as Grady Alexander, even if it was a have-to case, which of course she didn’t mention when she announced the wedding to her many friends. They would have guessed, though. Brides-to-be preferred to leave at least three months of daylight between the engagement and the wedding, just so people wouldn’t draw the wrong conclusion. Regardless of the cause, a hastily scheduled ceremony always got folks’ attention.

Beulah Trivette, owner of the Beauty Bower, heard the surprising news when Twyla Sue arrived on Tuesday morning for her regular shampoo and set. She was a stout lady with several chins, thinning hair, and a large brown mole beside her nose—one of Beulah’s more daunting challenges in the beauty department. She was lying back in the shampoo chair with her feet up on a stool and her head in the shampoo sink when she dropped the bombshell.

Astonished, Beulah stopped right in the middle of a vigorous shampoo massage. “Grady Alexander?” She wasn’t sure she had heard right. “Your niece is marrying
Grady Alexander
?”

“Archie’s niece,” Twyla Sue corrected primly, in her chirpy voice. “She may be a Mann, but she’s a beauty. You know the old saying. Girls are like peony plants—you can tell from the time they’re little whether they’re going to bloom or not. Sandra’s one of the bloomers, I’ve got to say—even if she ain’t but my niece by marriage.”

Bettina Higgens, Beulah’s beauty associate, had just finishing shampooing Leona Ruth Adcock in the neighboring sink and was about to wrap her head in a towel. She turned sharply to stare at Twyla Sue. “You say she’s marrying Grady Alexander? But what about—”

Bettina realized that Mrs. Adcock was all ears and bit back the question, but not quite in time.

“Grady Alexander is gettin’ married?” Mrs. Adcock sat bolt upright, her gray hair hanging down like a wet floor mop. “But what about Liz Lacy? Why, her and Grady have been on the brink of gettin’ married for three or four years, according to their mamas.”

Beulah’s heart sank. Leona Ruth was the biggest gossip in all of Darling. This juicy bit of information, true or not, would be the talk of the entire town by sunset. Liz would hear it and—

“Well, I can’t say anything about Liz Lacy one way or t’other,” Twyla Sue replied, with as much dignity as could be reasonably summoned by a lady with her head in a shampoo sink and her eyes shut against splashes. “All I know is that my sister-in-law Louise—she’s Archie’s brother Amos’ wife—rang me up last night to tell me that their middle girl, Sandra, is tying the knot with Grady Alexander. Sandra just turned twenty last week. Louise says she’d rather they wait. But you know young people in love. They’re in a hurry.”

Beulah did a quick calculation. Twyla Sue was on the party line that reached all the way out to the east end of Dauphin, on the south side of the street. Which meant that at least eight households already had the news, depending on who was home at the time and wasn’t too busy to get to the telephone. And if eight had the news and each one reached one (the way the revival preacher had told them they were supposed to do, to throw their sinful neighbors a lifeline to heaven), that made sixteen households. On the each-one-reach-one principle, it wouldn’t take more than a day for word to reach the farthest outposts of Cypress County.

Bettina wrapped a towel turban-style around Leona Ruth’s head and helped her out of the chair. “Amos Mann,” she said. “Don’t believe I know him.”

Leona Ruth bent over to pick up her black patent leather pocketbook from beside the shampoo chair. “When’s the weddin’?”

“This coming Saturday,” Twyla Sue said. She didn’t open her eyes. “Two o’clock. Amos and Louise live over east of Monroeville, which is why you don’t know them, Bettina.”

“Saturday.” Leona Ruth said in a meaningful tone. “So
soon.
”

Twyla Sue went on cheerfully, just as if she hadn’t understood exactly what Leona Ruth meant by that remark. “Louise says Grady is as impatient as a kid. He’s already got the rings—bought ’em yesterday at Cromwell’s Jewelry, and Louise and Sandra are drivin’ down to Mobile today to get Sandra’s wedding dress. Louise said Sandra has saved up twelve dollars from her job at the grain elevator. They ought to be able to get a real nice dress for that. Shoes, too. You can’t have a nice dress without shoes.” She opened her eyes to look up at Beulah. “Maybe you better put on a double helping of that setting lotion of yours, Beulah, so the curl will hold over until the weddin’. Although humid as it is,” she added with a resigned sigh, “it probably won’t.”

“I’ll do it,” Beulah agreed. “And I’ll send you home with a little bottle, so you won’t have to worry about it coming uncurled.” But at the mention of the rings and the wedding dress, her heart had sunk even further. Poor, poor Liz! When she heard, she would be devastated.

Bettina hooked a hand under Leona Ruth’s bony elbow and turned her toward the hair-cutting stations. “You just go over there and have a seat in my chair, Miz Adcock. I’ll be with you in a shake.” To Twyla Sue, she said, “Where did you say they are holding the weddin’?”

“I didn’t, but it’s at the Rocky Bottom Church of Christ. Preacher Jackson is doing the honors.” Twyla Sue folded her hands across her stomach. “Louise says it won’t be a big crowd. It’s just the families and closest friends.”

On her way to the cutting chair, Leona Ruth harrumphed
.
“Just the families,” she repeated knowingly. “And such a
hurry.
”

This time, Twyla Sue couldn’t ignore Leona Ruth’s remark. “Actually, it’s because money is so tight right now,” she replied defensively. “Louise said since it’s so far to drive, they didn’t feel they should invite folks to the wedding and not be able to invite them to the supper afterward. So it’s going to be small, and we’re all going to bring a dish for potluck.”

“Which we all completely understand,” Beulah said soothingly. “It’s hard these days. We’re doin’ a bit of belt tightening at our house, too.”

“Any word on where the newlyweds are setting up housekeeping?” Bettina asked. Normally, Beulah would have shushed her. Gossip might be a vital entertainment at the Bower (many clients came not just to get beautiful but to catch up on the news), but she didn’t believe that the beauty associates—she and Bettina—should participate. This time, however, she let Bettina’s question stand, since she wanted to hear the answer.

“Louise says they’re looking at houses here in Darling, since it’s closer to where Grady works,” Twyla Sue replied. “Mr. Manning is showing them the Harrison place.” Joe Lee Manning was Darling’s biggest real estate dealer. “It’s been empty for a couple of years and needs a lot of work. But it’ll clean up nice, I’m sure.”

The Harrison house, Beulah thought sadly, was just a block away from Liz’s sweet little cottage, which she was so proud of. She would have to see Grady’s house every day, as she walked to and from work.

“Having them in town will give Mrs. Alexander heartburn, for sure,” Leona Ruth said with barely disguised satisfaction. Beulah remembered that Leona and Mrs. Alexander had had a serious disagreement last year about the way the Baptist church vacation Bible school was run.

Sensing the problem, Bettina stepped behind Leona Ruth and gave her a little nudge. “Come on, Miz Adcock,” she coaxed. “Let’s get you started. You don’t want to spend all morning getting beautiful.”

Leona Ruth could not resist another harrumph, and as she sat down in Bettina’s chair, Beulah heard her say, “I’m sure Mrs. Alexander must be spittin’ nails. Why, Grady must be all of thirty-five, and that girl has just turned twenty? Robbin’ the cradle, if you ask me.”

Beulah turned on the faucet and began to rinse Twyla Sue’s hair. As a Dahlia and a friend of Liz Lacy, she couldn’t bring herself to believe that Grady had jilted Liz—who was smart and pretty and every inch a lady—for a girl just out of her teens who worked in a grain elevator over east of Monroeville. And a Mann, to boot! Not that the Manns weren’t perfectly good people, Beulah told herself hastily, because of course they were. Perfectly good.

Except that Twyla Sue and Archie’s oldest boy, Leroy, was known to be running with French’s bank-robbing gang over in Georgia, and their youngest, Baby Mann, worked in Mickey LeDoux’s bootleg operation. Archie sold Mickey’s white lightning from behind the saddles in his tack room, which would probably be illegal even after Prohibition was repealed. And Archie himself had a volcanic temper and had served six months in jail down in Mobile for assaulting a peace officer.

“Lucky it wasn’t six years,” Sheriff Roy Burns had allowed, and most of Darling agreed with him, especially since the Manns, as a family, had not been known to darken the door of a church for decades.

Beulah was a loving, generous soul and tried not to judge lest she be judged, the way the Bible said. But she was perfectly aware that most Darling folks did a fair amount of judging. They would think less of Grady for marrying a Mann when he could have married Liz. They would also suspect, as Beulah did, that he wouldn’t be marrying anybody but Liz if he didn’t
have
to. He would be tarred with two brushes, so to speak, both at the same time. When the baby was born, people would count the months backward from the wedding date, and when they got to seven or maybe even six or five, the women would press their lips together and nod knowingly and the men would wink.

Beulah knew what people would think because there was something about getting their hair washed and set that gave her clients permission to come out with whatever was on their minds—and they did. What’s more, she knew everybody in Darling, which shouldn’t be a surprise, since the Bower was now the only beauty parlor in town. Last winter, Julia Conrad had been in a little accident (her husband, Merle, had swerved to miss a pig on the Jericho Road) and was laid up with a broken hip, so Conrad’s Curling Corner was closed and would probably stay closed. But while breaking a hip was a bad thing and Beulah had every sympathy for poor Julia, she didn’t mind the extra business. She and Bettina were as busy as bees in a summer flower garden.

“And lovin’ it, just plain lovin’ it,” as Bettina said with a giggle.

Beulah had operated her shop on Dauphin Street for almost six years now. Petite, blond, and abundantly endowed where bosoms were concerned, she was a Darling girl from the wrong side of the L&N tracks. But Beulah had brains and ambition as well as beauty, and was determined to better herself. After high school, she took the Greyhound bus to Montgomery and enrolled in the College of Cosmetology, where she learned how to do a shampoo and scalp massage, cut a smooth Gloria Swanson bob, manage a marcel and a permanent wave, and color hair. She also studied facials, manicures, pedicures, and makeup—everything a beauty specialist needed to know “in order to make the ordinary woman pretty and the pretty woman beautiful,” as the College of Cosmetology advertised in its four-color brochure. Beulah studied hard and graduated with high marks in every aspect of beauty.

Back home in Darling, she had gotten right down to business and married Hank Trivette, the son of the pastor of the Four Corners Methodist Church. Hank was not the most exciting man she had ever met, but he was definitely from the
right
side of the tracks and Beulah, who was truly a practical person, thought that when all was said and done, love lasted longer when there was a little extra money in the cookie jar. They bought a nice frame house at the best end of Dauphin Street, and Beulah set up her Beauty Bower on the screened porch at the back of the house. She wallpapered the walls with her favorite fat pink roses, painted the wainscoting pink, and hung her College of Cosmetology Certificate of Achievement where everybody could see it. Then she painted the words BEULAH’S BEAUTY BOWER
on a white wooden sign, decorated it with painted flowers, and planted it right in the middle of a flower bed installed by her fellow flower-lovers, the Darling Dahlias, in front of her house. Anybody walking or driving down Dauphin Street would have to be blind not to see it.

A few months after the Bower opened, business was so good that Beulah hired Bettina Higgens. She wasn’t the prettiest flower in the garden (as Bettina herself put it) but she did know hair. Beulah and Bettina got on like a house afire, sharing a commitment to make all of Darling beautiful, one lovely lady at a time.

Since the beginning of the year, however, business had been falling off at an alarming rate. Usually, the chairs in the Bower would be filled with clients (Beulah refused to use the word “customers”) waiting their turn for a shampoo, a cut, or a perm. Beulah had a sunny disposition and always tried to look on the bright side of things, where the flowers bloomed. But it was hard to do that when many of her former clients were saving their rainwater to wash their hair at home and asking their sisters and their neighbors to cut and pin-curl it.