Authors: Dorothea Benton Frank
“And she never remarried?”
“Nope. She canonized DuBose instead. She spent the entire rest of her life protecting his name and making sure he got all the credit he was due.”
“Now
that’s
love.”
“That’s what I think, too. Come on, I’ll even let you use the bathroom first.”
All night long I kept waking up thinking I was hearing someone playing my piano. Of course that was ridiculous. And it wasn’t like they were playing a whole song. It was a few faint notes here and a few hushed chords there. I thought, boy, Cate, you’ve got some crazy imagination and I made a mental note to buy earplugs at the drugstore in the morning.
I couldn’t tell you when I finally fell asleep but I could definitely tell you when I woke up—it was when my cell phone rang at eight o’clock. It was Ella calling.
“Y’all want some breakfast? I’ve got my waffle iron heating up and there’s a pound of bacon sizzling away in my big cast-iron skillet.”
Waffles? Bacon?
“I haven’t even seen Patti yet but I’ll say
heck yeah
for both of us. Give us thirty minutes?”
“See you then!”
I threw back the covers and called out to Patti.
“Patti? Ella’s making waffles. And bacon.”
“I’m up!” she said. “Should we get dressed for downtown or are sweats okay?”
“Sweatpants are fine. Let’s walk on the beach after we eat and then we can do all the other things we’ve got to do.”
“Perfect. You’ve got sheet marks on your face.”
“Big shock.”
We pulled ourselves together in record time, hopped in the Subaru, and we were off. When we got there I emptied their mailbox and Patti picked up the newspapers. We went inside, using my key.
“Aunt Daisy gave you a key?”
“I thought it was a good idea for a whole lot of reasons.”
“It really is.”
Ella was in the kitchen watching the
Today Show
and turning bacon with a fork.
“Morning!” I said and gave her a hug.
“Sure smells good in here,” Patti said and hugged her, too.
“Nothing on this earth like bacon. And I have an apple pie in the oven for that nice nurse. Why don’t you girls make yourselves useful and set the table?”
“I’ve got the mail and Patti got the newspapers. No word from the hospital, huh?”
“Not a peep.”
“That’s good,” I said.
Happy birthday from our friends at Smuckers! Here’s Bessie Johnson as pretty as a picture. She’s one hundred and four, still likes to go bowling and she sings in the choir! Never misses a Sunday!
Willard Scott chirped.
“Humph,” Ella said. “She looks like she’s past dead, if you ask me! Listen to that fool man up there flapping his jaw. She sings in the choir? I’ll bet they wish she wouldn’t!”
“Yeah, and she bowls, too,” I said. “That’s gotta be fun to watch! These place mats okay?”
Ella nodded and I put them on the table.
“Someday they’ll have you and Aunt Daisy on that show,” Patti said. “Do you want me to melt the butter and syrup together?”
“Hush your fool mouth and hand me a plate, and yeah, melt it quick in the microwave,” Ella said and shook her head, hooking her thumb in its direction. “Oh, Lord! It’s so nice to have my two girls here.”
In minutes we were seated around the table, drizzling hot buttery maple syrup over steaming waffles and snitching a slice of bacon with our fingers before the first waffle was cut. Patti poured coffee and I turned down the television.
“Let’s bless this food with a little prayer for our Daisy,” Ella said and we did.
Fully fortified by another hearty meal, Patti and I thought about taking a short walk on the beach. Ella adamantly insisted on cleaning her own kitchen. It didn’t matter that Patti was an accomplished chef who cleaned and disinfected a kitchen like a surgical theater preparing to operate on the pope. Ella nearly always cleaned her own kitchen and when anyone else tried to help she twitched.
“We’ll be back in thirty minutes then we’ll run home and change and go downtown to Aunt Daisy? How’s that?” I said to Ella.
“You girls go get a little exercise but don’t be gone too long though. I want to get to the hospital before the morning slips away.”
“Wait,” I said. “We can skip the beach? Right, Patti?”
“Ella? We can take you downtown right now, and then come back,” Patti said. “Would that be better?”
“No, I’m just, you know, a little uneasy. That’s all. Besides, I can drive
myself
in my own car!” she said and I could see her anxiety all over her face. She would drive herself to the hospital, stay all day, it would get dark, she’d be scared to drive herself home. “I just want to wipe down my counters and start the dishwasher. You girls go on now.”
“No way,” I said, feeling stupid and guilty about not rushing her to Aunt Daisy’s side. “You’re right. Let’s get you downtown. It would actually be better to walk later on when it’s warmer anyway.”
“Yeah,” Patti said. “It’s awfully foggy and damp and this morning my throat was a little scratchy. Probably better to wait.”
“You girls haven’t changed a bit,” Ella said, pouring liquid dishwasher soap into its little compartment. “Always in cahoots with each other.” She closed the door and turned it on.
“What kinda cahoots?” Patti said.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know what she means.”
“I’ll get my coat,” Ella said.
“Anyway, it’s a waste of gas to take two cars,” I said. “Russ will bring you home whenever you want him to.”
“Why? Where are you going?” Ella said.
“John is taking Patti and me out to dinner tonight.”
“Oh! Patti, wait ’til you lay eyes on this man. He’s a
hunk
.”
“A hunk, huh?” Patti said and laughed.
When we were in the car, moving down the highway that was indeed like a bowl of pea soup, I remembered to ask if Ella needed help with the bills and so on.
“Ella? Would you like me to spend some time going through the bills and see if anything’s due? Check on tenants?”
“Oh, no, honey! I’ve got that all under control. Don’t worry. But you’re sweet to ask. I’ll let you know if I need something.”
“Okay,” I said.
Well, that’s good. Maybe they were more organized than I thought.
When we arrived at the Medical University, Patti got out of the car, too.
“Know what?” she said. “I’m just gonna run up there really fast to see how she did last night and I’ll be right back.”
“I can park and come up with you if you want,” I said.
“Nah, you look like who did it and ran. I’ll be two seconds!”
“Oh thanks!”
“Truth hurts!” she said and stuck her tongue out at me.
I lowered my window and called out, “How old are you?”
She turned to me laughing and slapped her backside, which was sister-code language inviting me to kiss it. I gave her the one-finger salute and hoped that Ella had not seen us. We were still not too old to catch the devil from her.
I looked in the rearview mirror and then the one on the visor. She was right. I looked like I hadn’t slept in days. Gosh, what a whirlwind it had been since I arrived here. First, a car wreck that throws a new man into my life, next I find out I’m going to be a grandmother, then John wants me to write a play, and I turn around to put Aunt Daisy in the hospital! Surely things would settle down now. What else could happen?
I listened to
Walter Edgar’s Journal
on National Public Radio while I waited. I swear, if that man could bottle his voice he could make zillions but I suspected that was why he had his own radio program for so many years. He was so nice to listen to.
Soon Patti was back in the car.
“How’s she doing?”
“She’s awake. They took out the breathing tube and now she’s got this thing on her finger, like a clamp. It measures her oxygen in her blood. She’s very hoarse and oh, did I mention that she’s pissed?”
“I’ll bet she is.”
“She wants ice cream and popsicles, and two vodka martinis, vodka because they can’t smell it on her breath and we’re to sneak it in to her in a thermos. And oh, if she doesn’t get what she wants, she’s getting out of that bed and walking home if she has to.”
“God, she must be feeling better. And what else?”
“The doctor wasn’t around but the nurse, that nice one from yesterday? She said Aunt Daisy is in for at least one more night. Her fever’s down so she’s responding to the antibiotic. They just want to be sure she’s entirely out of the woods.”
“Good. Was she happy to see you?”
“She wanted to know if I was here to claim my inheritance.”
“Only Aunt Daisy would ask such an outrageous thing.”
“And she wanted to know where the hell you were. Her words. I told her I just ran up to make sure she had a pulse.”
“Nice one.”
“She said to tell you that if you expect to inherit a dime she’d like to see you at her bedside. I told her you’d be back by lunch.”
“Then we’ll be back by lunch.”
Setting:
Show slides of the theater in Boston, then of the theater district in New York.
Director’s Note:
Show picture of the Gershwins with DuBose at a piano and then a head shot of George.
Act III
Scene 3
Dorothy:
When
Porgy and Bess
opened in Boston, we knew from the enthusiasm of the audience on opening night that we had a hit on our hands. Gershwin of course went out to take a bow and got a standing ovation. DuBose was there, too, standing behind him and you can hardly see him in the pictures. In any case, Boston loved it! But when the critics got hold of it they started to chew. Was it an opera? Not exactly. An operetta? Not technically. Was it a musical? Not really. The critics worked themselves into a snit trying to decide whether it was a white show or a black show and all sorts of really stupid remarks were made. Rouben Mamoulian, who was our director, summed up the bickering pretty nicely. He said, “You give someone something delicious to eat and they complain because they have no name for it.” Isn’t that the truth?
Anyway, the Boston run gave us confidence for opening in New York and there was one thing everyone agreed on—it was too long. So George began hacking away at it and in my opinion I think he destroyed a lot of its integrity. The New York run was only 124 performances. Now that’s great for an opera but not great for a musical. Needless to say, George and DuBose lost their shirts. Another problem was the segregation laws. Oh, what a mess that was, especially here in Charleston! It couldn’t be staged here until what? 1970?
Anyway, poor old George was never to know what a controversial piece of theater he created with us. He was performing in Los Angeles, working on
The Goldwyn Follies,
and began getting these terrible blinding headaches. He said he could smell burning rubber all the time. He thought the headaches were a result of getting hit in the head with a golf ball. He complained of being extremely sensitive to light. People thought he was just being dramatic. But then he began to have seizures. Finally, during a performance, he collapsed.
Not to get too involved in medical terminology, which I can barely pronounce, the kind of seizures he had were called automatisms, which made him do very bizarre things. During one of these seizures, he opened the door of a moving car and tried to pull the chauffeur out. He said he had no idea why he would do such a thing. Another time someone gave him a box of chocolates and he smashed them up into a pile of goop and smeared them all over his body.
Doctors finally decided he had a brain tumor and they operated on him at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital. After the operation his temperature went up to almost 107 degrees and his pulse beats were almost 180 a minute. Poor George never regained consciousness and he died. He was only thirty-eight years old.
The world was robbed of his incredible genius and DuBose and I were shocked and inconsolable.
Fade to Darkness
Aunt Daisy
“I
forgot my purse,” Patti said.
“Where? At the hospital?”
“No, at Aunt Daisy’s house.”
“So, we’ll stop and get it. I know the alarm code.”
“Okay, thanks. I hate when I forget things. Don’t you hate getting old?”
“No, I love getting old. In fact, I don’t know which part of it I love the most. Maybe the sagging jowly thing. How about you?”
“I was thinking memory loss but on second thought I’m gonna go with memory loss.”
“Nice.”
We got back to Folly Beach and were approaching Aunt Daisy’s house just as the mail truck was pulling away.
“I’ll go get it,” Patti said.
I pulled into the driveway and parked. I got out and stretched while Patti unloaded the mailbox.
“Boy, they sure do get a load of junk! There must be fifty catalogs here.”
“Here, give me a pile of that. Ella said that ever since Aunt Daisy broke her foot she’s been ordering stuff like a crazy woman. I think they breed.”
“Oh, I see. Catalogs have a sex life now?”
“Yeah, they get it on like rabbits.”
“You’re truly demented.”
We went up the stairs, I unlocked the door, turned off the alarm, and we dumped all the catalogs on the kitchen counter. An envelope fell out with my brother-in-law Mark’s office address on it.
“Hey, Patti? Do you know why Mark would be writing to Aunt Daisy?”
“Nope.” I handed her the envelope and she looked at it for a minute. “Let’s open it.”
“Are you crazy?” I said. “Aunt Daisy would have us arrested, after she kicked our butts the whole way to Iowa, that is.”
“Yeah, she’d keep the cast on for that one. But what is Mark doing that he’s not telling me about?”
“I don’t know.” I thought about it for a minute. What
was
Mark up to? “We could steam it open with the teakettle. I’ve done that before. You know, open it very carefully, read it fast, stick it back in the envelope, and iron it to reseal it?”
“Iron it? Nah. I never iron,” Patti said. “I’ll get the kettle going.”
So, there we were in Aunt Daisy’s kitchen like a couple of middle-school truants, waiting for the water to boil so we could see what that letter from the school principal was all about.
“So you
really
don’t know why Mark’s writing to Aunt Daisy?” I said.
“Nope. I don’t have the first clue.”
The kettle started pouring steam and I picked up the envelope.
“Well, we’re just gonna find out,” I said, and held it near the spout.
“Don’t get it wet!” Patti said. “The ink will run!”
“Quit stressing and get a knife.”
When it seemed loose enough we laid the envelope on the counter and carefully ran the knife between the flap and the envelope, pulling it ever so slowly and gently until it was open. Patti pulled out the contents. As she unfolded the letter, a check fell out, falling to the floor. I picked it up. It was a certified check for $100,000 from Aunt Daisy to someone named Heather Parke.
“Who the heck is Heather Parke?”
Patti was reading and practically gasping for air at the same time.
“What? What does it say?”
“Oh my God! It was for that woman, that woman with the baby! Look at this!”
I stood next to Patti and read.
Dear Aunt Daisy,
I am returning your check because after a lot of thought, some mighty serious soul-searching, and lengthy conversations with Addison’s attorney Mel and his accountant Dallas we all agree that Heather Parke is entitled to nothing. Your generous offer to give her this money would only be the beginning of a life of torture for you and for Cate, because we are certain that she would return time and again to try to extort more money.
History is replete with Heather Parkes, young women who make poor choices and wind up with unexpected dependants and eventual disappointment. Addison died bankrupt. If he had nothing to leave his wife and legitimate heirs, why would this woman and her bastard child be entitled to anything?
Let her file all the lawsuits in the world. In Mel’s opinion and in the opinion of his partners, her suit is without any merit whatsoever and would be thrown out of court. And Dallas, his accountant, says he will sign any papers necessary to show that Addison was indeed not only bankrupt but in such financial ruin that it is unlikely he would ever have been able to earn enough to satisfy his debts and be solvent again. Finally, you most certainly have no obligation to this woman. But your generosity is a testimony to your special nature and it is what makes us all love and cherish you so . . .
“That little bitch! Did she contact Aunt Daisy directly?” Patti said.
“She must have!” I could feel my head starting to pound. “I’ll kill her with my bare hands!” I meant it.
“We’d better put this back, Cate.”
We quickly refolded the letter with the check and slipped it back in the envelope. Of course the glue had dried and wouldn’t stick. Patti grabbed it and licked it, leaning on it with the heel of her hand to secure it. Finally, it worked in some places and the envelope didn’t look as though someone had tampered with it too badly. I hoped Aunt Daisy or Ella would just rip it open and not give the seal much attention.
“You know what’s in glue, don’t you?” I said.
“Who cares? Here’s my question for you. How are you going to keep your big fat mouth shut?”
“I don’t know because I am seething.”
“You’re not going to be able to do that. I know you.”
“Well, this was a pretty incredible secret for them to keep from me, wasn’t it?”
“Keep from
us,
not just from you. I’m going to have a little chat with my husband and see just how this whole thing happened. He has to know everything.”
“Want to go walk for half an hour? I think I need to, so when I face Ella and Aunt Daisy I can have on my game face.”
“Yeah, let’s do it.”
We locked up the house and walked out to the beach. It was getting closer to noon and the tide was out. Low tide and a warm sun were a beautiful combination and I reckoned the temperature to be somewhere near sixty. I began walking quickly and I could see Patti was struggling a little bit to keep the pace and talk at the same time.
“I can’t believe Mark knew about this and didn’t tell me,” Patti said.
“I can’t believe that woman had the unmitigated gall to try and get money from Aunt Daisy.”
“She probably hired some ambulance-chasing lawyer who took her case on contingency and he just figured he’d keep suing the next of kin down the line until he found some money,” Patti said. “Can we slow down just a little?”
“Sorry. I’m so angry that someone would harass Aunt Daisy, I could just explode!”
“It’s pretty horrible alright. Listen, she’s just some tramp . . .”
“Patti? I don’t care if she’s a tramp who works as a stripper or a nice person who’s a . . . who’s a
pediatric
hospice nurse
!”
“I’m not sure there is such a thing as a pedia . . .”
“
You
know what I mean. What’s the
matter
with people? I still can’t believe she had the guts to come to Addison’s funeral!”
“Yeah, in that awful weather, too,” Patti said and I knew she was trying to assuage my anger with a little humor.
“With
pictures
! I mean, of all the
crust
! And then, to get some lawyer to go after
Aunt Daisy
? Is she
kidding
? I’m so mad I could spit! Heather Parke. What a stupid name. Sounds like a garden in Scotland.”
“Yeah, her middle name is probably Lavender,” Patti said.
“Oh, shut up, you stupid ass.” We started laughing then, like we always did when one of us talked the other out of anger or disappointment or any of the less welcome conditions that were visited on all of humanity. “Oh, Patti! What does this all mean?”
“It means my husband has a brain, Aunt Daisy has a heart, and Heather Parke has some pair of calzones.”
“Great. All I need is a pair of red shoes and a dog named Toto.”
Someday, when I was more secure, I was going to do something wonderful for my sister.
She looped her arm inside of mine and said, “Look, don’t worry. I’ll wrestle the whole story out of Mark and then we’ll think of how to get her to leave Aunt Daisy and all other family members alone. There has to be a legal way to do it.”
“I’d rather slap her in the face about a million times.”
“You’re right. That would be infinitely more satisfying. Now let’s get downtown before Aunt Daisy slaps
us
.”
“Hey! Are we really going to bring her a thermos of martinis?”
“Absolutely not. We’ll get her popsicles,” Patti said. “I’m in no mood for bullies. Or olives.”
“Me either. Let’s move it.”
What happened next was
truly
like a scene from a play. The sisters, the two fiercely loyal felines from the sand dunes of Folly Beach, the middle-aged ones with dreams still in front of them to chase until their last breath, they power-walked, fast and furious, until they nearly collapsed at the bottom of the wooden steps that went over the white sand and scrub and buttercups that would be back to bloom in summer, climbing the flight of steps to their aunt Daisy’s deck and returned, albeit begrudgingly, back to reality.
“I hate reality,” I said to Patti.
“Yeah, Folly Beach is way better.”
I knew we couldn’t stop Heather Parke, the tramp with the supercilious name, from suing us until eternity. But she’d
never
see a dime from us and
I
was going to handle this from now on. Not Mark. Not Aunt Daisy. Not Mel and Dallas. Me. I’d find a free lawyer somehow, I’d ask John whom to call, and I’d file something in the courts to make her stop. Or at least to upset her enough to make her go away for a while. That decision meant I’d have to confront Aunt Daisy and tell her I knew what had happened. So what? I was old enough to know that the truth was nothing anyone should ever be afraid to face. Like Ella used to say when we were just little girls,
every back was fitted to the burden.
Well, I thought then, heaven knows I’ve carried plenty of burdens and I was still standing.
On the way to the hospital, Patti and I rehashed the letter and I told her my plan.
“You’re right, of course. But remember, you’ve got the stash money I gave you for just such an emergency. If you need it to retain a lawyer, use it.”
“I’m buying a laptop and a printer,” I said, apropos of nothing.
“What?” she said, confused.
“How am I supposed to write the Great American Play without a laptop and a printer?”
“Holy Dorothy and DuBose, Batman! Go for it.”
“You’re such a jerk, did anyone ever tell you that?”
“Why no, but thank you very much!” she said in the worst Elvis imitation ever. “Thank you.”
We picked up a box of popsicles at the 7-Eleven near the hospital and dropped them off at the nurses’ station once we got upstairs.
“How’s she doing?” we asked the nurse.
“She wants to know when we have happy hour,” the nurse said with a straight face.
“She’s feeling better,” I said.
“And you’ll be glad to know she doesn’t need a cast any longer. The X-rays showed her foot has healed just fine. We fitted her with a rocking boot this morning, for a little extra support.”
“She probably wanted to know how many colors it came in,” Patti said.
“Boy, you really know your aunt!” the nurse said and took the popsicles.
We sat with Aunt Daisy while Ella went out to stretch her legs and get a cold drink. It was such a relief to see her with her eyes open and to hear her voice, even as raspy as it was.
“Where have you been?” she said, in a whisper. “Ella’s boring me to death.”
“You are incorrigible,” I said, smiling.
“We got a late start,” Patti said, as though she felt the need to confess. “And we took a walk on the beach to shake out the cobwebs.”
Aunt Daisy nodded and then she smiled.
“Tetanus! Who knew?” she said.
“Yeah, talk about a long shot,” I said. “The doctor said it was only the second time in his whole career that he’d seen a case of it.”
“He’s single,” Aunt Daisy said.