Runabout (25 page)

}"And neither is Luther Briggs."

}Mrs. Bruder wagged a finger at her daughter in disagreement. "Now, I wouldn't be so sure about that."

}Feeling a lecture coming on, Tulsa May took her mother's hand into her own. "I'm a nice person, or at least I try to be. And I'm smart, I know that. I'm just as bright as anybody in this town, including Papa and Doc Odie. But I know that I'm not a pretty girl, Mama. That's all right. I'm used to myself, and I don't mind. But I
am
plain, Mama. And men don't want a woman that's plain."

}Constance Bruder shook her head. "You make plainness sound like a fate worse than death."

}"It is a kind of death," Tulsa May answered. "It's a social death. I remember once Miss Maimie told me that 'a plain woman rarely rises above the bottom of life's heap.' " Tulsa May gave her mother a humorless grin.

}"Why, that old biddy," she said. "How dare she talk to you that way? It makes me so mad I can't hardly see straight." Mrs. Bruder was red-faced. Her indignation was a sweet sight for Tulsa May to see.

}"What other nonsense did that old woman tell you?"

}Tulsa May shook her head for a moment as she thought back. "She said I am the
worst
kind of plain woman."

}"The worst kind?" Constance pursed her lips in disapproval. "What on earth did she mean by that?"

}"The worst kind are the ones that tend to forget how homely they really are. They just go on with life, forgetting their place. Expecting to have the kind of life other women take for granted. Pretty soon, the worst kind of plain woman is making a fool of herself over some man. Thinking that he cares when what he really feels is pity."

}"Pity! That's the silliest thing I ever—" She stopped abruptly. "Is that what you think about Luther? Do you think he's calling on you out of pity?"

}"Luther Briggs is my friend," Tulsa May answered, her face flushing. "He has been since we were children."

}"Yes, he has been," her mother agreed. "But men don't go calling on women they consider just friends."

}"Mama, he's just—"

}"Has he kissed you?"

}"What?"

}"I asked if Luther has kissed you."

}"Mama that's not—"

}"I know it's not any of my business. And I also know from your reaction that he
has.
He doesn't sound like a friend to me."

}"Friends kiss," Tulsa May insisted.

}Mrs. Bruder shook her head. "Friends hug when they are glad to see you. They give you a peck on the cheek when the news is good and they lend a shoulder to cry on when the news is bad. But they never kiss."

}Tulsa May stood and turned away from her mother. She felt strange and jumpy and all confused inside. She walked over to the mirror in the corner of her room. Standing there, she looked at the obsessive neatness of her hair and remembered how only a short time ago it furled about her face in all directions. She stared at herself for long moments. Again she felt the bitter taste of Miss Maimie's words. She would never be pretty. Plain, homely, ill-favored, it didn't matter what descriptive term was used. As Miss Maimie had said, she could never have any hope with a young man like Luther Briggs.

}"He did kiss me," she admitted softly to her reflection.

}She heard her mother's sigh of delight behind her.

}Did a kiss, even a very sweet and wonderful kiss, guarantee that a man cared for a woman?

}Perhaps it
was
pity. For despite what her mother said, Tulsa May knew that Luther was her friend. Her mother was very wrong about that. Suddenly she hoped that her mother wasn't wrong about everything.

}

}The tiny bell over the doorway jingled as Emma Dix stepped inside the Emporium. The morning had been a busy one for Emma. Her father's condition appeared worse. But he was becoming fussy about her hovering over him. Finally the old man had insisted she go to town.

}"A pretty girl ought to be out buying pretty things," he'd told her. "Not sitting next to the sickbed of an old man."

}She'd been reluctant to leave the house ever since he'd become soaked in the rain. Once outside, though, Emma felt better than she had in days and she was determined to enjoy herself.

}Several ladies were already inside the store, talking animatedly as Emma walked in. At the sight of Emma the chatter miraculously ceased. That was typical, but today Emma refused to allow their reactions to bother her. Holding her chin high, she gave the other customers only vague greetings.

}Since the scandal when she'd run off with Fremont Bateman, Emma Dix was
almost,
but not quite, beyond the pale.
Almost;
for the simple reason that no one in Prattville knew for sure what had happened. Emma had left and Emma had come back. Much speculation was made about what she had done in between. But no one knew the facts.

}Facts for most small towns wouldn't have been necessary, but there had been that terrible misunderstanding several years ago about Cora Sparrow, and all the ladies who had shunned her because she'd been divorced were later forced to make embarrassing apologies when the true facts about her marriage were revealed. Since then, Prattville had become reluctant to make hasty judgments.

}But many in town
had
made up their minds, and quite negatively, about Emma. And Emma, unlike Mrs. Sparrow, had not been maligned unfairly. If the whole truth about her past ever came out, the entire town would be shocked.

}For several months, Emma Dix had lived in open adultery with a married man. When she found she could no longer abide that life, she was out on the streets. Opportunities for young single women were hard to come by, so she'd become a barmaid. She'd decided any honest work was preferable to being a rich man's whore.

}She had wanted to marry, to reclaim her reputation, but bachelors with honorable intentions didn't often linger in bars. She had been so lonely, so alone. And she'd had more than one ill-fated love affair during those years.

}Now she had come home. It had been a clean break from the past and an opportunity to change her ways. But she hadn't changed. Instead she had begun a secret and illicit liaison with Luther Briggs.

}Of course, that was different, she told herself. She wanted to marry Luther Briggs. She'd always had her eye on him. Luther was the most handsome man in town. He was smart, had a steady business, and enough money to keep them comfortably.

}If she could have coaxed him into courting her openly, she would have. But he hadn't seemed interested in a serious alliance. So she had offered the bait she knew men found difficult to resist. And she hadn't been sorry. Luther Briggs knew just how to please a woman in bed, and his Indian heritage kept him nearly as much on the edge of society as her past kept her. It seemed to her a perfect match.

}Unfortunately, the potential bridegroom had proved to be a bit more difficult than she had anticipated. And now he'd broken off with her completely.

}Emma refused to worry. Luther Briggs would be back. Doc Odie was right. A woman like her could have pretty much whatever she wanted. What she wanted now was the life she'd so carelessly thrown away years ago.

}Her chin still high in the air, Emma made her way down the counter of the Emporium with a politely civil nod to each of the ladies present as she passed. After a few uneasy moments, she was ignored again and the chattering of gossip resumed in mid-sentence.

}Emma stood casually near the hosiery counter, ready to wait. It was a game Mrs. Titus Penny played. She was too careful to openly slight Emma or cut her directly. But she ignored the young woman's existence until the last possible moment and then she hurried through any transactions as if her business were contaminating.

}Emma was on to the game and had perfected the bored visage of the browser to protect herself from the slight.

}However, today only a few moments passed before young Maybelle, Mrs. Penny's daughter, hurried up to her.

}"You take care of Mrs. Bowman," the young girl called out. "I'll help Miss Dix, Mother."

}Emma got an excellent view of the expression on the elder Penny's face. Clearly the woman was furious. It was all Emma could do to keep a straight face.

}"I'm sorry you had to wait," Maybelle said in her most pleasant storekeeper voice. "I'm afraid Mama and the ladies are quite caught up in the latest gossip."

}"Gossip?" Emma felt the color drain from her face. She hoped that nothing new had come out about her. She'd confided in Doc Odie about Luther, but she would never believe
him
to be untrustworthy.

}Maybelle leaned slightly forward, her bright blue eyes sparkling with excitement. "The whole town is speculating about Luther Briggs and Tulsa May Binder."

}Emma's relief was immediately followed by chagrin.

}"It seems to me that those two have been friends for a lot of years," Emma said deliberately. "I can't truly imagine anything more to it."

}"I couldn't either," Maybelle admitted. "I mean, Tulsa May is very nice, but she's just so ... you know, so ... ordinary. And Luther is
so
handsome. I was just sure it was a tempest in a teapot."

}Emma nodded.

}"Even after he bought her those gloves," Maybelle said. "Those peach and brown ones were really beautiful and he said they were for someone special."

}Emma hadn't heard about the gloves and her mouth tightened.

}"Even then," Maybelle continued, "I really thought they were mostly just friends."

}"I'm sure that is exactly what they are."

}Shaking her head, Maybelle widened her eyes and leaned forward to whisper. "I went on a picnic with them to Frogeye Creek. They headed out first, in a rather big hurry it seemed to me, and Arthel and I followed, unable to keep up with them."

}Her slightly uncomfortable hesitation at her own fib heightened the drama.

}"We came upon them on the road. They were sparking and kissing and—" Maybelle's voice dropped even lower. "She had her hair all undone."

}Emma stood staring at her, frozen in place. "I don't believe it!"

}"I saw it with my own eyes," the younger woman insisted.

}"He must be toying with her or ... or ..."

}"Or he must be really in love."

}Maybelle's bright, hopeful, dreamy gaze cut Emma to the quick. Her knees suddenly seemed a little shaky, then a fury overtook her. How dare he! She suddenly forgot her past and reputation, and remembered only that she had given herself to Luther and he had carelessly tossed her aside. Her breath seemed strangled in her chest. She wanted to hurt Luther. To make him suffer for treating her badly. She didn't know how she was going to do it, but Emma was going to make Luther as miserable as she was right that moment.

}"Now, what was it that you wanted?" Maybelle asked.

}Emma wanted to scream "Nothing" and race out the door. But she couldn't give the gossips, or Luther Briggs, the satisfaction.

}"Stockings," she answered a little louder than necessary. "I believe I'd like to look at some stockings."

}For twenty of the longest minutes of Emma's life, she remarked, criticized, and complained about the quality of the Emporium's silk hosiery. Finally, when she'd rejected every pair that the store had, she made her way out, the little bell jangling behind her.

}Once outside, she exhaled deeply, as if she had been holding her breath. She was still furious.

}It was the biggest humiliation of her life. Luther Briggs had thrown her over—and for an ugly duckling like Tulsa May Bruder. Thank heaven that no one in town knew. Still,
she
knew and the knowledge seared.