Dixie Divas (5 page)

Neither of us spoke until we were well down Highway 7 again. I turned to look at Bitty.

“Something was different in the house. I feel like we missed something.”

“What we missed,” said Bitty as she slowed down to turn into the Sonic drive-in, “is my ex-husband dead on the floor. I’m relieved and disappointed at the same time. I knew it was too good to be true.”

She pulled into a slot and cut the Miata’s engine. I smelled fried onion rings. Bitty looked at me. “Sonic has great chili dogs with cheese.”

“Order two.”

“Footlongs?”

“You bet.”

When all else fails, Coney dogs provide temporary comfort as well as dimples on the butt and thighs. Not a bad trade-off.

Chapter Three

“What are you doing Saturday?” Bitty asked, and I cradled the cordless phone between my ear and shoulder and kept stirring milk gravy in the iron skillet to keep it from lumping.

“Same thing I did last Saturday, I imagine. Why?”

“The Divas are having a meeting.”

“Is this an invitation?”

“Three of the Divas can’t come. You can be my guest.”

While I thought over that honor, the gravy got thick too fast. I grabbed the cup of milk, poured some in, added salt and pepper, and then said, “Are you sure?”

“I’ll pick you up at ten-forty-five. Bring something chocolate.”

“What?”

“Believe me,
any-
thing chocolate works just fine. My end is covered. I’ve bought enough wine to keep
California
solvent.”

No one knows what all goes on at these meetings, but there are rumors of Johnny Depp posters being violated in most interesting ways. Men aren’t allowed to attend other than as entertainment.

“All right,” I said as if uncertain, when I’d been salivating at the idea of seeing for myself what went on at the Diva meetings, “I’ll come to the meeting if you really want me there.”

When we hung up, I smiled. Bitty obviously feels a sense of responsibility for scaring me with a false murder. Truthfully, I’m glad she didn’t listen to me about going to the police. Not only would we have looked like idiots, but the last I heard, there are penalties for making false reports about dead bodies.

Not to say we both didn’t wonder why Philip Hollandale hadn’t been making a huge fuss over getting hit in the head and left for dead. He’s the kind of man who thrives on things like that. His silence was unnatural. Bitty had even been talking about calling him to see if he’d pick up his cell phone, but couldn’t think of a good reason for it if he did answer.

“It’s not like I can say, ‘Hey, why aren’t you dead?’ without him being suspicious,” she’d remarked thoughtfully.

“I don’t know,” I’d replied, “that seems to be right in line with a lot of the things you say to each other.”

That much is very true. As I’ve mentioned, their divorce had enough acrimony to fuel the local papers for well over a year.

We came to the conclusion that Philip must be involved in something shady, or as Bitty said, “Larceny is his favorite activity next to having a hot young blond hum
<_x0020_place>Dixie
on Bobo,” and so decided not to let it worry us too much. However, Sanders was still missing and that might be cause for concern if he didn’t show up fairly soon. He isn’t known for straying far from home.

Mama and Daddy got up early as always Saturday morning, and they went out to feed the legion of stray cats that stay in the old barn and supposedly keep the area free of mice and rats. It seems to me that the only thing getting scarce is twenty pound bags of cat chow, but maybe that’s because the mice and rats chew through the bags and eat most of it.

It was one of those early February days that start out so nicely and too often end in storms and flash floods. Best to enjoy the sunshine while possible. I went out to the barn, stepping carefully to avoid cats. They crowded metal feeding pans with only an occasional spat.

“Bitty’s coming to pick me up in a little while,” I said, and Mama looked up at me with a smile.

“You’re going to a Diva meeting?”

A little astonished that she knew about the group, I nodded. “It should be interesting.”

Daddy said something that sounded like
“At the very least”
but I wasn’t sure.

Mama went back to dipping out scoops of cat chow into metal pans, while Daddy turned on the hose and filled up shallow water bowls. Inside the barn, he’s built shelves around the top of the loft and covered them with strips of carpet. Wooden boxes hold soft cotton rags, and small cat-sized ladders climb up walls to reach all kinds of hiding places.

Cats of all sizes, colors, and personalities come running when Daddy yodels, “Heeeeere, catty-catty-catty-catty-catty!”

It’s an amazing sight. It’s like the horses running at
Belmont
when the gates open. It’s the greyhounds at the dog track bursting out of cages to chase the rabbit. It’s a 50% sale at Macy’s.

With no children in the house, my parents have become nurturers to the animal kingdom. There are worse things to be. What worries me is who’s going to take care of them when my parents grow unable to do it. I have a feeling my name is at the top of the list. While I love dogs and cats, I’ve always thought of them in manageable numbers. Like one. Thankfully, my parents are also civic minded and work with the local humane society to spay and neuter. If not for that, there wouldn’t be a square foot of catless space left in
Marshall
County
.

“I’ll be home later,” I said when the cat pans were full and I had my parents’ complete attention again. “Is there anything I can pick up for you at the store while I’m out?”

Mama patted my arm. “You just go and have fun, sugar. We have all we need here.”

That seems to be very true.

Bitty showed up at twenty ‘til eleven. She had the top down on the Miata and a scarf over her head, and wore sunglasses. The tangerine scarf was the same shade as her cotton tangerine blouse, cotton tangerine slacks, and tangerine shoes. The belt was a bright yellow with a sunburst buckle. I completely understood the need for sunglasses. I felt drab in my faded blue Lee jeans, long-sleeved green knit shirt, and teal windbreaker.

“Is that some kind of uniform?” I asked as I got into her car, and she laughed.

“Yep. I’m a sunshine girl. What’s in the cake pan?”

“
Mississippi
Mud Cake.”

“‘Atta girl. Something decadent and rich.”

She turned up the radio to a golden oldies station and we blasted down
Truevine Road
to the rhythm of Jerry Lee Lewis banging out
Great Balls of Fire.

“You’re in an awfully good mood,” I said when we turned off
Randolph
onto Van Buren. “Just get an extra alimony payment?”

“Nope.” She smiled so big the face-lift scars by her ears puckered. “I got to gloat at Trina Madewell about getting the Sanders house for the tour. That always makes me cheerful. She’s such a spiteful thing.”

I turned in my seat to look at her. “You talked to Sanders? What’d he have to say about your ex lying out in his foyer?”

“Well, I haven’t actually talked to him since we took that first batch of chicken and dumplings out there. I haven’t had the nerve to go back, not after seeing Philip laid out like a Thanksgiving turkey, and, as usual, Sanders hasn’t returned my calls.”

That worried me. “Maybe that was Sanders you saw lying in the foyer?”

“Good Lord, Trinket, I may be nearly fifty, but my eyesight hasn’t gone yet.”

“You’re fifty-one.”

“That’s nearly fifty from the other side. It’s just as close as forty-nine.”

I couldn’t argue with her logic. “Don’t you think Sanders should have returned your calls by now?”

“Not really. He doesn’t use the phone much, if at all. If you want to talk to him, you have to go out there. I don’t know why he even has the blamed thing if he won’t use it.”

“Uh, when are you going back out there?” I wanted to know so I could be busy.

“Next time I catch you off-guard.” Bitty knows me too well.

Bitty took the left side of the Y that leads uphill to the Delta Inn just across from the railroad depot, downshifting but not quite coordinating correctly with the clutch. The Miata snarled a protest, she cussed, and then got it right. Whoever gets this car after she trades it in is going to need a new clutch, at the very least.

By the time we parked between the Delta Inn and the former saloon-slash-whorehouse-slash-grocery store, I was sure I heard the car making strange noises under the hood. I hoped Bitty had the local tow truck’s number in her tangerine purse.

I got out with my cake and looked at the store. Now it serves locally famous hamburgers, cheeseburgers, and homemade fried pies. It’s a two-story with a porch on the top that conjures up images of shady ladies waving to prospective customers as they stepped off the train. An addition to the right side houses the current owners. History seeps from walls, wood, and even the railroad tracks only ten yards away.

The old railroad depot is even more impressive. While it’s been there since before the Civil War, it’s been burned, rebuilt, and added on to so that the original structure has changed a great deal. It’s a beautiful old red building, Victorian in style, emanating history, style, grace, and echoes of a life gone by. What a coup it’d be to get it on the Historic Register as well.

As for the Delta Inn, it’s one of the loveliest structures in
Holly
Springs
. It was built in 1852, has three stories, white painted old red brick, and four white columns holding up a porch and balcony all the way across the front. Upstairs rooms have doors onto the balconies, and I could just visualize ladies in hoop skirts sipping morning tea and afternoon mint juleps outside their rooms while waiting for the next train. There’s a rambling garden at one side, with rose bushes, flower beds and huge holly trees, and several big dogs that look and sound ferocious but are really dangerous only to butterflies and ham hocks. The iron scrollwork gate is kept locked except for visitors.

Bitty took a cardboard box from what can be referred to as a back seat if you’re inclined to be generous, and I heard the clink of bottles and recognized her contribution.
California
wine country has another month of good revenue.

“Need any help?” I asked, but should have known better. Bitty’s always been able to carry her wine well. We walked up the cobblestone path to the front porch. Sweet-faced pansies in big concrete pots flanked the double doors.

The hotel is in a state of renovation. Rayna Blue lives in the lobby, as she has for years. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Rayna, but I recognized her at once when she came to the hotel door to hush the dogs and let us in. She still looks a lot like she did as a young woman in her teens even though she’s fifty-one. Slender, with dark hair and big gold eyes, she’s about five-five and wears her clothes with an artistic flair. As an artist, she’s usually got a few paint smudges somewhere on her face or hands. Today she was paint-free and dressed in a loose black skirt and belted tunic top, with sandals on her feet. Big silver earrings tangled in her brown shoulder-length hair.

“Trinket!” she said, and gave me a hug. “What’s it been, seven or eight years?”

I hugged her back and handed her the covered cake pan. “Something like that. It was the summer your cousin Possum Perkins robbed the Merchant and Farmers’ bank at their drive-in window.”

Rayna grinned. “Since he deposits his money in a tin can, he’s not that familiar with how banks work. It didn’t occur to him to un-tape the big
For Sale
sign from the back window of his truck. The cameras got an excellent view of his phone numbers written in black magic marker. Of course, he also forgot that his ex-wife works there as a teller.”

3I remember that,” Bitty said with a laugh. “Possum was so surprised when the police showed up at his house later.”

Rayna shook her head. “Possum drinks to excess. Bless his heart. Look who’s already here. You remember Cady Lee Forsythe and Deelight Tillman?”

Since I remembered Cady Lee but not Deelight, I covered up my lapse with a smile and nod in their direction. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

Cady Lee put her hands on her hips. “Trinket Truevine. I haven’t seen you since we were drunk on champagne in the back of Stewart Carmichael’s hay wagon.”

“Good Lord. I’d forgotten about that. Stewart was drunker than we were, because he ran the mules and wagon into a kudzu ditch and couldn’t get us out. His daddy had to come with the tractor to get that wagon back on the road, so we rode the mules home. What ever happened to Stewart?”

Cady Lee grinned. “I married him. We had three kids and an amiable divorce. We still play poker together every now and then, but only when my husband can make it. I married Brett Kincade the second time around. He was a few grades ahead of us. Do you remember him?”

I shook my head. “Maybe if I saw him again.”

Cady Lee had always been the school beauty, even back in elementary school. Back then she had soft brown hair and big brown eyes. Now she has ash-blond hair and big turquoise eyes. One of the perks of new technology. Stewart Carmichael’s family owns several farms, a meat-packing plant, and an oil refinery. They may have bought a senator or two as well. Last I heard, newly reelected Philip Hollandale owes a major portion of his campaign contributions to
Carmichael
influence. The Kincades own a chain of department stores. Cady Lee has obviously done well, in marriage and in divorce.

She wore diamond earrings as big as a butter bean on each ear, had a marquis-cut emerald ring on her right hand, a wedding set that had to be at least fifteen carats on her left hand, and her nails were perfectly manicured. Cady Lee has a tan in the wintertime and it looks natural, so she probably spends a lot of time down on the coast.
Biloxi
is only about five hours away by car, but my bet is she spends her money across the Gulf on the
Florida
peninsula.