Alvera bumped Clarice with a bony butt when she reached the gazebo. "It's my turn. This is an open forum with no agenda so I get my say-so just like you do."
Clarice set her mouth in a firm line. Her jaw muscles gritted with suppressed anger but she stepped aside and gave her spot to Alvera.
"No one cares about your opinion," she whispered.
"And everyone gives a shit about yours?" Alvera whispered back.
She raised her voice so everyone could hear. "I'm glad to see the young folks and the new ones comin' in here have an interest in our community. They've got some good ideas and they're the ones who're goin' to be seein' to it that Saint Jo doesn't rot and fall down around everyone's ears before too many years. Give 'em some rein. Support 'em. We need to stand behind these kids as they try to fill our boots. How in the hell are they going to succeed if we knock 'em down every time they come up with an idea? And that's my opinion."
"You are an old idiot," Clarice said out the side of her mouth.
"And you are an old idiot with dyed hair," Alvera shot back as she left the gazebo.
"Mamie?" Griffin said from the other side of the gazebo where he'd retreated when Alvera started up the two steps into the gazebo. He was grateful for the few feet of space and the few minutes of time away from Julie. Just being in close proximity to her was making him sweat.
"There's no vote to it. Either the city agrees and the police force says they'll back us, or we don't do it," she said.
"Let's all think on it for a week. The next real meeting of the city council is a week from Tuesday. We'll all attend and have a show of hands then," Griffin suggested.
It was a good idea but the fact that Griffin came up with it instead of Julie sure didn't settle well.
Mamie spoke up from the rear of the group. "I agree. Be thinkin' about the issue and if you are for it, bring your ideas to the meeting. If you aren't, bring your reasons why."
Clarice folded her arms over her chest. "Seems like a bunch of hogwash to me. Me and Everett and the rest of the folks was runnin' this place before y'all kids was dry behind the ears. We know what's best. You'd do well to listen to us."
"She makes as much sense as a bull calf fartin' in the wind," Alvera piped up from her lawn chair.
"Alvera, you'd argue with a stop sign," Clarice yelled.
Alvera smiled. "I would if I thought I was right and the damn thing was wrong."
Griffin spoke up. "Okay, let's all stew on it a week."
"Thank God some kids has sense," Clarice said.
"That's the first thing you've said all evening that has any truth to it." Alvera wasn't finished arguing.
"Refreshments are ready in my store," Mamie yelled.
Several people made their way across the lawn and into her place. By the time Julie and Annie arrived, the store was packed. Everyone had a cup of punch and a cookie or else they were waiting in line to get one. Julie held Annie's hand tightly and got in line behind Griffin and Lizzy.
"Why are you for such a thing?" Griffin asked. Frankly, he'd gone to the town meeting undecided whether he'd want another festival or not. It was Julie being for it that had caused him to speak up against it. Maybe if they were on opposite sides he'd see her for the conniving witch she had to be.
"Why are you against it?" she shot right back. Frankly, she didn't give a damn whether Saint Jo had one festival, two festivals, or not a blessed one. But Mamie thought it was a good idea and Mamie was her friend, so she would support her. Well, there was the fact that Griffin was against it, too. Maybe if they were on opposite sides she'd see him for the egotistical, domineering Texan he was and stop fantasizing about him being a wonderful man.
He leaned against a display case. "Because Clarice is right. It's going to bring in the riffraff. Are you even remotely aware of the drug problems around here? Didn't you do a bit of homework before you moved to this area? Don't tell me you had the preconceived notion that Saint Jo was Mayberry."
"Every town has its problems. I didn't move here with my head in the sand, but there's also no reason why Saint Jo couldn't grow," she said.
He shook his head and moved over to talk to Everett, a round man in bibbed overalls and a faded blue shirt. Julie would never have pegged him as one of the town's more prominent citizens.
Mamie made her way through the crowd of people in her small store. "You'd never guess Alvera and Everett are wealthy ranchers, would you?"
"I figured Clarice owned the town. Thank God for Alvera and Everett. At least they're not as negative as Clarice," Julie whispered.
Evidently all that black hair dye had not harmed Clarice's hearing one bit. She raised her head and shot Julie a look across the room meant to turn her into nothing more than a slightly greasy spot on Mamie's floor. Without blinking she pushed a couple of men aside and came to stand nose to nose with Julie. "Miss Donavan, I do not like you. I shall talk to Catherine Amos this week and you will not be back to teach in Saint Jo next year, so your opinion matters less than a frog's ass in my town. Don't get too comfortable and don't be thinkin' to take any of Griff's money just because his brother went to bed with you and you have a Luckadeau child. I've heard all about you and your kind is the riffraff we don't need in Saint Jo."
Alvera spoke up from near the refreshment table. "Clarice, that's enough of your mudslinging. You want to taste a little mud, I can give you a mouth full. Eat your cookie and think about something that won't raise your blood pressure."
Julie wanted to hide under a table or else hurry up or get the hell out of Dodge—or Saint Jo as the case was. As red as her face was after that comment from Clarice, she wasn't totally sure she wouldn't set the place on fire. That hateful woman had just outed her and Annie both with her smart mouth. What everyone had wondered about was now out there in living Technicolor on the big screen—Graham Luckadeau had an illegitimate daughter.
"What have I gotten myself into?" Julie whispered.
People stole sideways glances at her and then at Annie and Lizzy sitting side by side on a bench beside the cash register.
So much for keeping Annie's parentage a secret. She might as well stand up on the display case and give them intimate details of that night she spent with Graham Luckadeau.
Alvera made her way through the crowd to Julie's side. "Don't listen to that old bag. She thinks she runs the whole damn county and that governors and presidents are in her pocket. Hell, honey, they wouldn't know her from an old Dallas bag lady. She's all hat and no cattle."
"Thank you," Julie said.
"So that's Graham's daughter, is it? Nice that she's back around her family. You're a fine asset to our community. And don't worry about Catherine Amos. She's my sister. You ain't goin' nowhere."
Chapter 6
A HOT WIND BLEW THE TREE LEAVES, THE HEAT ALMOST cooking Julie's fair skin. They waited on the porch, Julie making a list with her pencil and paper, and Annie spinning around the yard like a ballerina. She'd applied a liberal dose of sunblock on all her bare skin and then went to work on Annie before tucking the tube into her tote bag. According to Mamie, who'd been to these regattas before, she needed a quilt to toss out on the grass around the lake, sun block, extra clothing for Annie, and an appetite. Mamie was bringing a cooler full of beer, soda pop, water, and sandwich makings for lunch.
Annie's dog ears flopped with every jump. "I love living here Momma. It's so much fun."
"Even when you have to help me make squash relish?" Julie asked.
"I don't like the way the squash leaves scratch me when we get them out of the garden but I like cooking with you. When can I have a pony?" Annie said.
"For now you'll have to be satisfied with your kittens," she said, glad that she didn't have room for a pony. Annie had an adventurous streak even wider than Lizzy's. If she had a pony she'd be racing off to the Lucky Clover every chance she got and Julie adamantly did not want her daughter at that ranch.
Julie was doing well with her new canning business. Most of what was in the cellar had sold and Julie couldn't replenish it because Mamie kept buying everything she had time to put in jars. The new items up for grabs were bread and butter pickles made from Edna's recipe and squash relish and dilled green beans made from Julie's grandmother's recipes. While she waited for Mamie, she made a list of what she'd need the next few days from the grocery store. For one recipe it took six yellow squash, two onions, and two peppers. The garden produced much more than that, so she'd probably do several batches. There was enough salt, celery seed, and mustard seed left in the pantry to last five years. But she was low on sugar and vinegar so she added that to the list.
"I might as well get forty or fifty pounds of sugar because I'll use it before the garden plays completely out," she mused aloud.
"Sugar? You want sugar?" Annie swirled over and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
"Thank you," Julie beamed and then found the recipe for the dilled green beans. She checked the recipe. Green beans cut to fit fairly tightly in the jars. Add one fourth of a teaspoon of hot crushed red pepper, one half teaspoon each of mustard seed and dill seed, and a very small clove of garlic in the jar with the beans. Heat five cups of vinegar, five cups of water, and half a cup of salt to the boiling point and pour over the beans. Adjust jar lids. Process in boiling water five minutes. Remove and cool.
"Vinegar and lots of it. Might as well buy several gallons if I'm going to get through a whole week," she said.
"What are you talking about?" Mamie yelled from the car when she parked.
"Cooking. She wanted sugar so I gave her some but I don't have any vinegar," Annie said. "Are we ready? Tell me more about the boats and their pretty sails. I'm hungry. Can we buy hot dogs and cotton candy when we get there?"
"Terrible twos. Question fives," Mamie giggled.
"You got that right. Try a classroom of fifteen of those never ending questions," Julie said. "I was going over the squash and bean recipes so I could make a run over to Gainesville after church tomorrow for supplies."
"Make up everything you can lay your hands on by Friday. California is coming through and he said he'd take everything I have in the store. So I can sell every thing you've got this week."
"Who is California?" Julie asked.
"This damn good lookin' man in his forties who visits his mother in Muenster once a year. When he does, he buys my whole stock. I asked him once what he does with it and he says he uses it for gifts if he doesn't eat it. He owns this big company in San Francisco. Want to meet him? I've flirted with him for five years but it doesn't do a bit of good."
"Ever think maybe his train runs a different track?" Julie asked.
"That's it. Praise the lord, I'm not just fat and ugly," Mamie said.
"If you say that about my friend we're going to have a big old cat fight. Nobody talks about you like that, not even you. Give me a minute to put all this inside and lock the door," Julie said.
"I'm glad you moved here. You are good for me. How do you think the city meeting will go next Tuesday?" Mamie asked.
"We'll win them over on a one-year basis. But we'd better work our hind ends off or that's all we'll ever get and then they'll gloat in their victory. You want to usher the old out and the new in, you'd better get ready to work for the responsibility. Let's get this hyperactive child of mine to the regatta before she blows a gasket," Julie said.
"Tell me about it again," Annie said from the back seat of the car.
"More than twenty years ago, two sailors moved to the lake area, one on the west side and one on the east. They both had sailboats and liked to sail on the lake and, as luck would have it, they started racing. Then, about fifteen years ago, they invited some of their sailboat friends to the lake and they all had a race. That began the Nocona Sailboat Regatta. It gets bigger every year and this year ought to be really good because there's a good wind picked up. I heard that the race was going to have thirty boats this year from as far away as Waxahaxie."
"Is that still in Texas or is it on the moon?" Annie asked.
Mamie laughed. "It's still in Texas. The boats are gathering right now at the Storey Boathouse in the middle of the lake. At ten minutes to eleven the horn will sound four blows. At five minutes 'til eleven it will sound three blows; one minute 'til, two blows, and then at eleven o'clock it will blow one time and the race will begin."
"Hurry, I want to hear the horn blowing. I've never been to a rematta," Annie said.
"Regatta," Julie and Mamie said at the same time.
"That's what I said," Annie told them.
"What time is the whole thing over?" Julie asked.
"At three thirty the small boat race starts. At four the revenge race and multi-hulls start. After that, we'll dash back home, take showers, and get cleaned up for the dinner served up by the Nocona Rural Volunteer Fire Department. Awards and music after that, then the auction."
"All day! Yippeee," Annie said.
"Auction?"
Mamie nosed her car into a parking place. "The Regatta has an auction. Donated articles, but pretty nice most of the time. The money goes to the Nocona Rural Fire Department."