I glanced across the aisle at Emma Sue, who was sitting in her usual pew on the right side, second row from the front. The woman was entranced by every word that issued from Curtis Maxwell’s mouth. She sat there, as plain as she’d ever been, gazing raptly at the man she’d told me was only a candidate for membership in our church. That wasn’t the way it looked to me, and I shook my head at the unseemliness of it, wondering if anybody else had noticed this inappropriate display of adoration. Whatever her purpose was, it didn’t look good in my opinion. Emma Sue was playing with fire, being so openly receptive to Mr. Maxwell’s attentions. And what would happen if those attentions flared up? She’d get burned, that’s what.
Then Mr. Maxwell got to the highlight of his sermonette: The theme park was having a Pre-Grand Opening this coming Saturday night, with a special invitation to all the churches in the county.
“Now, don’t expect the theme park to be completely finished,” Mr. Maxwell said, his smoothly barbered face all aglow, “because it won’t be. But enough has been done to make you want to take an active part in completing this great project. In fact, the Pre-Grand Opening will be an old-fashioned tent meeting, and it will prove to be a blessing to each one of you, I promise you that.”
Uh-huh, I thought to myself, they need more money to finish the thing, and that’s the reason for a Pre-Grand Opening. Well, I thought, I was willing to write a check, but for a better cause than a slap-dash replica of the land of Palestine. And that brought Mr. Pickens’s continuing silence to mind. How was I going to pay that woman, if he didn’t let me know something?
Mr. Maxwell went on and on in a similar manner and, if he mentioned Maxwell Household Products once, he mentioned them a dozen times. I was surprised, when the service was finally over, that he wasn’t surrounded by people clamoring to buy bathroom deodorizer.
I was so offended by the use of our pulpit for a marketing spiel, that I herded Little Lloyd and Hazel Marie out one of the side doors. I didn’t want to speak to the man or to his black-robed sponsor. And, as far as showing off my new ring to LuAnne or anybody else, that could wait till Tuesday at our reception for Tony Allen.
As we walked down the sidewalk beside the church on our way home, Hazel Marie, having noticed my spiritual discomfort, ventured to say, “At least he was a good speaker, don’t you think?”
“All the more reason to beware of him,” I said. “He has a twofold agenda, it seems to me. One is to drum up contributions to that rag-tag group out there on my property, and the other is to sell his less-than-satisfactory cleaning products.” I stomped on down the sidewalk, so full of outrage that Hazel Marie had to skip to keep up with me. “And possibly one more thing, and that is to create enough mischief to turn Emma Sue’s head further than it’s already been turned,” I said as we climbed the porch steps. “Did you see how she was looking at him? If the pastor didn’t notice it, he must be blind.”
As Little Lloyd opened the front door for us, he said, “I didn’t notice anything. How was Mrs. Ledbetter looking?”
“Oh, my,” I said, biting my lip. I kept forgetting that the child understood more than I often gave him credit for. “She was looking quite well, Little Lloyd. She’s trying to take care of herself a little more, and that’s all I meant. Now, run upstairs and change your clothes before we have lunch.”
As he ran upstairs, I turned to Hazel Marie. “I’m sorry that I so often speak without realizing how much he takes in. I shouldn’t’ve let fly like that.”
“Oh,” she said, as we both headed to the kitchen. “He doesn’t pay that much attention. Don’t worry about it.”
We placed our pocketbooks on a side counter and commenced removing dishes from the refrigerator. Lillian always prepared enough for Sunday lunch on Saturday, and all we needed to do was heat it up. She and Latisha would soon be home, since their services lasted a little longer than ours.
“Miss Julia?” Hazel Marie said tentatively. She was at the sink, filling a pan with water for tea. She set the pan on a stove eye and turned to me. “I’ve been thinking.”
I looked up from setting the table, immediately on my guard. Whenever Hazel Marie said she’d been thinking, I knew to prepare myself. “What about?”
“Well, you know how worried I am about Lloyd growing up without a strong male influence and you know how unlikely it is that J. D. is going to provide that on a permanent basis, so I’ve been thinking that I ought to look around a little.”
“Lord, Hazel Marie, in this town there’s nowhere to look. Mr. Pickens is the choice by far.” Which, I thought but didn’t say, indicated the level of available men in Abbot County.
“Well, I know he is, but if I can’t pin him down to making a family for my boy to grow up in, then I might as well give up on him.”
I didn’t say anything for a few minutes as I tried to figure out how I felt about this sudden about-face. I liked Mr. Pickens and Little Lloyd practically worshipped him, a fact that elevated the man in my opinion. On the other hand, Mr. Pickens was so free and easy and uncommitted and irresponsible that he would drive any woman crazy. Hazel Marie might be better off to look for another fish in the sea.
“That’s interesting, Hazel Marie,” I said, trying not to take sides one way or the other. “Mr. Pickens is a fine man after his fashion, but I can see that he’d be hard to live with.”
“Live with! I can’t even get him on the phone!” Hazel Marie slammed the oven door shut, then walked over to lean on the counter. “Little Lloyd needs a father who is respected and successful and someone he can look up to, and someone who can help him get a good start in life.”
“I don’t know anybody like that around here,” I said as I put the butter dish on the table. I smiled at her. “You have anyone in mind?”
“Yes, I do. Curtis Maxwell.”
I dropped the cover on the butter dish. “Hazel Marie! You don’t want that man! Why, he’s a hypocrite of the first order, going around selling household products in churches and sponsoring that fringe group out yonder. How can you think such a thing!”
“He has a lot going for him,” she said, a smile pulling at the corner of her mouth. “Lloyd would have all the advantages.”
“He already has advantages,” I snapped back, refraining from mentioning where they came from. “Hazel Marie, you can’t be serious about this.”
She laughed. “No, I just wanted to see what you’d say.”
“Well,” I said, fanning myself with a place mat, “don’t scare me like that again.”
“I am serious about one thing, though.” She straightened up and stood with her hands on her hips. “I’m giving considerable thought to looking some place other than J. D. Pickens.”
“One more week,” I said, recalling the announcement of the big Pre-Grand Opening of the theme park for the following Saturday and hoping he’d have Monique paid off and on a Greyhound bus by then. “Give him one more week, Hazel Marie. I think he’ll be here eating us out of house and home by this time next Sunday.”
She frowned at me. “Do you know what he’s doing?”
Before I could answer—not that I wanted to—Lillian’s car drove up and we heard her and Latisha heading for the door.
“We could go to Six Flags,” Latisha said, as they came inside. She was still on her favorite subject. “They got them flags over just about every state in the world. I think we ought to go to a theme park
some
where, don’t you?”
“I’m with you, Latisha,” Hazel Marie said. “I’ve been wanting to go for ever so long, and one of these days we’re just going to pack up and go.”
“I’m not studyin’ goin’ nowhere,” Lillian said, reaching for an apron. “Le’s us get something on the table, so I can start makin’ my pecan tassies. We got to have I don’t know how many dozen for our party.”
That was the end of the conversation concerning Hazel Marie’s lifestyle choices, for which I was thankful. But, before she let her fancy run far afield, I had to get Mr. Pickens back, lest she ruined her life and turned Little Lloyd into a worldwide jet-setter.
=
Chapter 32’
For the rest of the time leading up to the day of the reception, I didn’t let Hazel Marie out of my sight. Determined to give her no time to think of replacing Mr. Pickens, I kept her hopping. She and Lillian and I had given so many teas, coffees, receptions, and open houses that each one of us knew what had to be done, and we went about doing it—dusting, straightening, arranging flowers, polishing silver, and all the other last-minute preparations necessary for the critical eyes of our guests.
I knew she was still calling Mr. Pickens and getting his answering machines, which meant that she had not given up on him entirely. And whenever she was out of earshot, I was doing the same, hoping to get him back to defend his rights. It just frustrated me something awful that there was no way to reach him. He needed to know how dangerously close he was to losing what he was out at that place trying to protect, and I needed to know how big a check I had to write. There was only one way to get to him and, though I hated the thought of doing it, I knew I had to.
“Hazel Marie,” I said, walking into her room where she was trying to decide which of her outfits would compare favorably with Tonya Allen’s New York couture. “This is the last thing I want to do, but I think I ought to go to that Pre-Grand Opening Saturday. I want to see what they’re doing on my property, and if I don’t like it, which I probably won’t, I’m going to evict them. Now,” I said, hurrying to forestall any help from her, “it’s not necessary for you to accompany me. I’ll ask Sam to go, so you and Lillian and the children can rent a movie and make popcorn. Or something.”
“Oh, Miss Julia, I want to go,” she said, which was exactly what I had not wanted to hear. She laid another dress on the bed and stood back, considering it. She looked up at me. “Let’s all go together. I haven’t been to a tent meeting in a long time. There used to be a lot of them, and somebody always got filled with the Holy Spirit, and people got healed and everything. A lot of stuff happens that you never see in a downtown church.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of. I’m not sure it would be conducive to Little Lloyd’s spiritual growth to witness such a spectacle.” I stopped, bit my lip and thought about it. “I’m not even sure it’ll be conducive to mine.”
“I’ll talk to him about it before we go,” she said, turning back to her closet. “It’ll be good for him to know that people worship in different ways.”
“Well, I don’t know, Hazel Marie. Train up a child in the way he should go, you know, and to me that means not giving him a choice until he’s old enough to make the right one. Well,” I said, seeing that her mind was centered more on choosing the right dress than on shielding that child from deviant influences, “maybe we won’t have to worry about it. Maybe it’ll rain Saturday and wash the whole thing out.”
But later that night, I found myself downright eager to get out to that place. It was after midnight when the telephone beside my bed jarred me awake. Scrambling to get it, all I could think of was that Emma Sue was on the rampage again.
“It’s me,” Mr. Pickens said. “Just listen, because I don’t have much time.” Then he told me Monique Mooney would accept a sum of money that made me gasp. But, quickly recovering, I realized it wasn’t as much as it could’ve been if she’d known my net worth.
“Agreed,” I said, “on the condition that she never set foot in this county again. You told her that, didn’t you?”
“I did, and she knows she’ll have me to deal with if she comes back looking for more. Here’s the way we’ll do it. She wants to be part of the opening program Saturday night, so you come, too, and bring the check. I’ll meet up with you when it’s over, and get it to her.”
“Can’t we do it before then and be done with it?”
“No, that’s the way she wants it. She’s going to leave right after the program without telling Dooley a thing.” He laughed quietly. “I’m going to drive her to the bus station, so I’ll know she’s gone.”
“You don’t know what a relief it is to hear that. I’ll be there, Mr. Pickens, and I hope we’ve seen the last of her.”
And before I could express my heartfelt gratitude, he said he had to go and hung up. I slept until the children clomping up and down the stairs woke me the next morning, and it was the best night’s sleep I’d had since Dwayne Dooley came ringing my doorbell.
N
Tuesday, the day of Tonya’s coming-out party, dawned bright and clear for a change. It was a perfect day for the entertainment of the year. The caterer arrived, bearing trays piled high with finger sandwiches of all shapes and sizes, cheese straws, cheese balls, fruit slices, tiny cream puffs, petit fours, cookies, and tarts, as well as concoctions for the chafing dishes. Lillian’s pecan tassies were arranged on one of my best silver trays, and two thirty-cup urns of coffee perked on the counter, while tea steeped on the stove. Hazel Marie brought in the silver service to await the hot beverages, while I placed flowers around the punch bowl gracing one end of the dining room table. It would be filled with an ice ring and ginger-ale punch. Not spiked, of course.
Hazel Marie had finally settled on a simple, A-line dress of pale pink silk faille. “I wanted something classic,” she said, “and pink is so good this year.” She fastened the strand of pearls I’d given her around her neck, and pinned on a pearl and diamond brooch that she’d bought for herself. As she turned for my viewing, I had no doubt that she would hold her own with anything Tonya Allen would wear. Of course, I would’ve chosen a more decorous pair of shoes, but she told me that sandals with three-inch heels and ankle straps were the height of fashion, which made me wonder if she’d break her neck falling from that height.
I’d been so taken up with all the worries on my mind that I’d hardly given a thought to my own party ensemble. I knew that The Ring, as I’d begun to think of it, would lessen the attention paid to anything worn on the rest of my person, but it also made me want to wear something that was equal in grade and quality to such an outstanding piece of jewelry. I mean, would you wear diamonds and sapphires with a house dress? Well, Hazel Marie would, but I wouldn’t. So I ended up with an off-white crepe with long sleeves and a high neck. The Ring stood out like the North Star against it, especially since I was careful to hold my hand just so.