IdaClare thanked her, and said, "I'm sorry, dear, for behaving like an old fool. And a cranky one at that. I swear, I don't know why weddings always do this to me."
Hannah knelt down, the voluminous slip billowing around her like a frothy cloud. "You were upset at Rosemary and Leo's wedding because it reminded you of yours and Patrick's and you miss him so much."
Nodding, IdaClare dabbed the inner corners of her eyes with the napkin. "I've missed him every minute he's been gone, but yes
it's hard to be happy for someone elseeven when you
truly are
and eaten up with envy at the same time."
"Except that's not why you're upset today, is it?" Hannah caressed a blue-veined, spotted hand. For decades, IdaClare worked as her rancher husband's number-one foreman, cattle-wrangler and calf-roper. "What's bothering you is that you wish I was marrying Jack instead of David."
Fresh tears rambled down IdaClare's face. "You'd be so perfect together. No insult to David, but I knew that from how Jack talked about you, before we ever met. If only that boy had come to his senses in time."
Hannah shook her head. "He did, IdaClare. Jack tried for so long to be something he's not. And just because the love of his life is named Stephen, not Stephanie, or Hannah, doesn't mean you or Patrick did anything wrong."
Pain lanced those bright, Clancy-blue eyes. Hannah softened her tone but didn't blunt what needed to be said. "Jack is who he is, IdaClare. You'd love him with all your heart, even if he turned into an ax-murderer. I know you sometimes think that'd be easier to accept, but only when you put your happiness before his."
"I have
never
"
"You can either stop crying about not being the mother of the groom and act like the mother of the bridewhich you are, as far as I'm concernedor keep making yourself miserable about a son who's done the Clancy name proud in every single respect that matters a damn."
IdaClare snatched away her hand. Pale, then flushed, she tensed as though ready to storm out of the house. "You have no right to speak to me like that."
Staring into the distance, she wicked the moisture from her face and her wattled neck. "But it's high time somebody did."
That somebody should have been her son, Hannah thought. But Jack feared his Irish temper as much as IdaClare's and likely didn't want to risk saying something he didn't mean, and couldn't ever take back.
IdaClare picked apart the soggy napkin. "People are going to ask who Stephen is. What do I say? How do I introduce him to people?"
"Well," Hannah said, "I think, 'This is Dr. Stephen Riverton, the best OB/GYN in St. Louis' will do just fine."
"But what if someone asks if he and Jack are
a couple?"
"'A couple of what?' is the best comeback I know of."
"A couple of what?" IdaClare repeated. Straightening in the chair, a defiant smirk crimped her lips. "Hah. That'll nip it in the bud, won't it."
"Works for me." Hannah grinned. IdaClare was a long way from accepting Jack's lifestyle, but at the moment, she looked almost eager to try out her new zinger.
The honorary mother of the bride pushed upright so fast, Hannah nearly tumbled backward on her butt. "Heavens to Betsy, young lady. That's a slip, not a dust mop. Just 'cause that dress is beige doesn't mean the dirt won't show underneath."
Hannah took the hand she offered, saying, "It isn't beige, it's cream-white."
"I don't care if it's fire-engine-red with tassels on the bust." IdaClare pointed at the clock on the opposite wall. "We've got eighteen minutes to get to the park, lest that poor boy thinks you've left him at the altar."
Fifteen minutes elapsed before IdaClare, Marge and Rosemary stepped back, their eyes brimming with tears at the creation they'd buttoned, poked, prodded and bickered into shape.
The resourceful, practical Claudina had taken a closet door with a built-in mirror off its hinges and leaned it against the living room wall. The glass was cloudy and the silvering worn away in places, but all Hannah saw was a reflection she hardly recognized.
She'd never thought of herself as an ugly ducklingwell, not since her knees were constantly scabbed and her eyes too big for her face. A swan she'd never been, either. Not even close
until now.
The strapless satin gown was banded at the top and hem in a pale, bronzy taupe. The gentle belled skirt nipped her waist and narrowed her hips, the fabric folding into soft pleats at the back below a crisscross-laced panel.
Its simple, elegant design effected a grace and sophistication no child raised in a trailer park known as Tin Can Alley bothered dreaming of, because silk purses can't be made of sow's ears no matter how many stars you wish on, or prayers you whisper.
Vaguely aware of the Battle of the Veil erupting around her, Hannah twirled this way and that, entranced by the skirt's fluid dips and sways. She couldn't wait to see the look on David's face when he saw her. A childish second self wished everyone in Effindale, Illinois, who'd ever taunted her for being a no-account Garvey could, too. It wouldn't change any minds, though, and plenty of family members had lived down to that reputation.
I'm not a silk purse, she thought, smiling at the lovely lady in the mirror, and I'm not a sow's ear. I'm just Hannah Marie Garvey, soon to be Hannah Marie Garvey Hendrickson, who doesn't wear too much gunk on my face and laughs a lot and doesn't get mad if I get dirty.
"Hannah wants the veil down," Marge said.
"She certainly does," Rosemary concurred. "Like brides used to wear them."
IdaClare said, "Well, that's the silliest thing I've ever heard. What's the sense in nobody being able to see her face?"
"David will," Rosemary said, with a dreamy sigh. "When he lifts it to kiss his bride."
"Oh, pshaw." IdaClare fussed with the headpiece, gouging craters in Hannah's skull. Fluffing the veil forward, she retreated a few steps, then crossed her arms, her head angled like a curator examining a Rembrandt.
"Beautiful," Marge said.
"It's so sheer, you can hardly tell it's there," Rosemary agreed. "And I love those tiny little spangly thingies. They'll sparkle like diamond dust when the sun hits them."
IdaClare clucked her tongue in disgust. "Well, I still don't like it"
"You wouldn't admit it, if you did," Marge snapped.
"but if that's what she wants, at least it'll keep the skeeters off of her."
"The limo's here," Claudina yelled from the front bedroom. "Ready or not, it's time to rock 'n' roll."
* * *
David stood in a copse of walnut trees where Luke had dropped him off. The wedding planners had won more arguments than they'd lost in the past couple of weeks, but David refused to wade into the crowd gathering in the park. The groom wasn't expected to mingle before a church wedding, and he damn well wouldn't here.
Besides, a little peace, quiet and solitude gave him a chance to admire the miracle Luke and Claudina had pulled off. They'd drafted a small army of helpers, but the results were nothing short of amazing.
A white canvas runner divided row upon row of chairs obtained from every rental outfit in a hundred-mile radius. At the far end was a flower-twined arbor backdropped with a hurricane candelabra where David and Hannah would repeat their vows.
Off to one side, a gazebo was hung with gauzy curtains, where Hannah would wait, unseen, until her walk down the aisle. Between it and the bandstand, tables clothed in starched white linens were shaded by green canopies, courtesy of Duckworth's Funeral Home.
From a refrigerated delivery truck, Willard Johnson and his mother, Benita, the special-event baker at Petits Fours & More, were unloading boxes of individually decorated squares of cake for the reception. Ruby Amyx, a vision in sequined, scarlet lace, was arranging and rearranging silver paper cake plates, forks and imprinted napkins.
The squad of official greeters were all surnamed Hendrickson. David's mother and sisters-in-law were each armed with a guest book, and his father and brothers ushered the multitudes to their seats. His nieces and nephews scurried from one row to another doling out sunblock and old-fashioned paddle fans. Plain ones, not the imprinted "Hendrickson for Sheriff" kind Luke had wanted him to get.
David ran a finger under his shirt collar, telling himself he'd be roasting from the inside out if he'd worn a black tuxedo instead of his dress uniform. Any discomfort he felt now from feeling less like a groom, and more like a politician masquerading as one.
Hannah had insisted on the uniform. Like she'd said, the last time he'd worn it was to Bev Beauford's funeral. From now on, when he took it from the closet, wouldn't he rather be reminded of their wedding?
The fact that Hannah considered his profession a point of pride, not something he should apologize for, made David smile. The most amazing woman in the world was marrying him because she loved the man he was, not the one she hoped he'd change into.
"If I was you, I'd be hiding back here, too, old buddy."
Startled, David turned, the voice not registering, until he found himself practically nose-to-nose with Jessup Knox. His opponent's presence wasn't a surprise. His triumphant expression wasn't, either.
"Mighty fine party you and Sauers done cooked up here, Dave. Real festive. Romantic, even." Knox surveyed the hundreds of people laughing and talking in their seats, waving their fans at friends and neighbors spied in adjacent rows.
"Leastwise, it is, if you got no more respect for the sanctity of holy matrimony than you do a cattle auction at the feedlot."
"Sorry to disappoint you," David said, clenching his teeth, "but if you're spoiling for a fight, it won't be with me."
"Spoiling, huh?" Knox chuckled. "Funny choice of words, Dave, since that's exactly what I aim to do to this dog-and-pony show of yours."
"What's going on?" Luke demanded, rushing up beside David. Behind him were Chase Wingate, Jimmy Wayne McBride and Junior Duckworth.
For the benefit of the newspaperman in particular, David replied, "I was telling Mr. Knox that his opinion of the wedding was another of about ten thousand things we don't agree on."
"Wedding," Knox spat. "It's electioneering and you know it." He gestured at David's uniform. "You getting all duded up and calling this a wedding is about as ridiculous as your bride'll look wearing a white dress."
Jimmy Wayne took a step forward. "That's enough."
David motioned him back. He hadn't anticipated the slur against Hannah, either, but it wasn't every day that a man bent on hanging himself brought along his own rope.
"Not that being born on the wrong side of the blanket is the sin it used to be," Knox went on. "I've talked to some folks from Ms. Garvey's hometown in the past coupla weeks. They give her all kinds of credit for being a big-shot ad executive. What she must've done to get there, they ain't real proud of, but you know what they say, like mama, like daughter."
Pity leavened David's chuckleor what the other men would interpret as such. "Spew all you want, Knox. I won't take a swing at you, and I can't throw you out of a public park. Wouldn't if I could."
He shook his head. "There's any number of people who'd think poorly of me for it, because they believe you're a fine Christian man, not a gutless wonder that wants to be sheriff for all the wrong reasons."
Knox's complexion flushed a deep red, but his voice was oddly composed. "You're right, Dave, ol' buddy. This here is a public park, only it's me that's throwing
you
out."
He yanked a folded sheet of paper from his shirt pocket. "The mayor made me this copy of the city-use permits issued for the month of August. You bein' hazy about the law and all, I s'pose you didn't know that without one, you're violatin' city statutes and subject to arrest for unlawful assembly."
David nodded at Chase Wingate. "Did you get all that down?"
The editor, scribbling furiously in his notebook, muttered, "Almost."
Luke peered over Wingate's shoulder. "Why they don't teach shorthand in school anymore is a mystery to me." He tapped his suit-coat pocket. "But, anything you might have missed, I've got on tape."
Knox looked from him to Jimmy Wayne to David, who said, "The problem with dirty politics,
ol'buddy,
is that sooner or later, that mud splashes back all over you."
"And the mayor," Jimmy Wayne said, "who ought to know better than to copy city documents for his or anyone else's personal use."
With a dramatic flourish, Luke presented a notarized document he'd obtained in the event Knox acted precisely as he'd anticipated. "You're the one who's hazy about the law. As an officer of the court, it's my duty to inform you of codicil to that statute you and Mayor Wilkes are so fond of.
"To wit, Mr. Knox, when this land was deeded to the city, the donor retained a proprietary right to its usage, until his death, plus fifty years. The clause was designed to keep the city from selling the land to a developer, or for uses other than a public park."