T
he letter came the next day. Less than forty-eight hours after my aunt’s funeral I received an envelope addressed to me in her round, hurried scrawl, and my body went rag-doll limp as I ripped it open. How wonderful to imagine that Aunt Caroline wasn’t dead! It had all been a ghastly mistake, and someone else was buried in that plot on the side of the hill behind Cleveland Avenue Presbyterian Church. After all, wasn’t she writing to me as always?
Only the letter had been forwarded from my Charlotte address, and the postmark was over a week old. I took the tissue-thin pages into the living room so I couldn’t see the stairs where she fell, and read through a hot film of tears. The letter was dated four days before she died:
Wish you’d stay at home once in a while! I’ve tried to phone three times.
Guess what? Remember that old Bible you brought with you as a child? Well, I ran across it while dusting the bookshelves the other day—the day after I found that cute picture of you and the little boy at the Easter-egg hunt. (Sam, wasn’t it? You used to talk about him all the time). Anyway, the Bible had fallen behind that set of encyclopedias, and no telling how long it’s been there—which should give you an idea of how lax I’ve become about dusting, or about looking things up, for that matter!
At any rate I think I’ve discovered something that might lead to exciting news—at least I hope it will. I’ll tell you about it when you come for Mother’s Day.
Can hardly wait to see you! Am trying hard to lose weight, but just this once I’ll bake us something special. What about a strawberry shortcake? That was always your favorite.
By the way, I’m holding off announcing your engagement in the paper here until I hear from you. It’s not too late to change your mind, you know. And Delia tells me several of the churches there in Charlotte have active singles groups!??!
Much love as ever from your aunt Caroline
I smiled. My aunt never did take to the idea of my marrying Todd. The one time I brought him home with me he came to the dinner table wearing a baseball cap, and to top it all, never wrote a proper thank-you note. Maybe I should’ve picked up on that. Good raising will always tell, Aunt Caroline said.
I folded the pages into a tiny square and tucked them into my bra as I sat in her rocking chair, my hands on the worn arms where her hands had been. This was as close as I was ever going to get to the woman who raised me, and I felt hollow inside without her.
Later, when Delia came over to help me sort my aunt’s belongings, I showed the letter to her as we wrapped Aunt Caroline’s fragile, fern-patterned china, her crystal stemware, and packed them in boxes. For me, my neighbor insisted, because my aunt would want me to use it, pass it on.
But pass it on to whom? I thought, picturing (with relief) a baby with Todd Burkholder’s big ears, wearing a baseball cap.
“Did Aunt Caroline ever mention that Bible to you?” I asked.
Delia shook her head silently as she read the note, then wiped her eyes with the hem of her apron. “No, but then I was in Atlanta for over a week during Doreen’s surgery—had that by-pass thing. Doreen’s my only sister, only sibling, really. We lost our little brother when he was just a child.” She looked at the letter again. “I expect she ran across your Bible while I was away.”
“Wonder what she meant by, ‘something that could lead to exciting news,’” I said. I couldn’t imagine anything exciting in my family background.
“Why don’t you look and see? Where is the Bible? Maybe we can find out.” Delia ran a finger around the rim of a goblet. It made a clear, ringing sound.
“That’s just it, I can’t find it. I’ve looked in her desk, the table by her bed, all the likely places.”
“Must’ve put it somewhere for safekeeping,” Delia said. “It’s bound to turn up when we start going through the books.”
But it didn’t. Aunt Caroline had put away the Bible soon after I came to live here. It was old, she said, and the pages were thin. I was given a sturdier, modern translation that was still in the stand next to my bed in my two-room Charlotte apartment, or it was the last time I looked. I’ve sort of gotten out of the habit of reading it, I’m afraid.
The old family edition I’d brought with me to Snapfinger Road had a place of honor on the bookshelf in the living room until, somehow or other, it must have slipped behind the row of bulky reference books.
I didn’t find the Bible in the tall, glassed-in case in the back hall, or in any of the numerous stacks of “books to be read” that had accumulated around the house. I even checked my aunt’s “secret” places where she used to hide my Christmas gifts in a crevice behind her closet shelf, or buried in her lingerie drawer. Nothing. Again I searched the shelves in the living room. No luck there either.
“Delia, have you noticed anybody unusual over here lately?” I asked as we emptied the kitchen cabinets.
She examined a rusting sifter and tossed it aside. “What do you mean
unusual
?”
“Somebody you didn’t know. Somebody who … well, maybe shouldn’t have been here.”
“Well, other that the usual folks, Bonita Moody’s the only person I’ve seen on a regular basis. Now,
she
’s peculiar—but probably not in the way you mean.” Delia looked at me through narrowed eyes. “Mary George, why are you asking me this? Surely you don’t think somebody was responsible for Caroline’s death!”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m just asking.” But I did know. I knew somebody had killed my aunt just as surely as I was standing there on her worn blue linoleum with a chipped brown pitcher in my hand, but I didn’t want to frighten Delia.
I put the pitcher aside with the sifter. “Who’s Bonita Moody? What do you know about her?”
“Not much to know. Late thirties maybe, cashier at the Triple Value—you know, that new mart where the feed store used to be. I’ve noticed her over here several times. Rabbity little thing. Acts like she’d wet her pants if you said boo.”
“When was she usually here?” I asked.
“Monday afternoons as a rule, about the middle of the day. Always parked in back. I’d see her turning in when I came out to get my mail.”
“Did Aunt Caroline ever mention her?”
Delia looked at me strangely. “I never asked, Mary George. Just figured she must’ve been helping with some of the heavy cleaning. Caroline wasn’t up to it with her blood pressure and all. ’Course, she’d never admit it to me. Your aunt didn’t tell me everything, you know.”
Did I detect a bit of resentment there? “Do you remember if she was here the day Aunt Caroline died?” I asked.
“That would be on a Tuesday, so I doubt it—no, wait! That was the day I took the kitties to the vet for their leukemia shots, and I saw her turning in as I backed out of the driveway. I remember wondering why she was coming on a different day. You know, Mary George, I believe she was here.”
“Did you see Aunt Caroline after she left?”
Delia sat abruptly and propped her head in her hands. She reminded me of the illustrations in nursery rhyme books with her dainty Mother Goose face and white hair pulled back in a neat bun. And when she stood her head came barely to my chin. Now she looked like a little old child sitting there and it made my heart turn over. “I don’t remember … I honestly don’t remember! Mary George, is this important? Do you really think that woman had anything to do with Caroline’s fall?”
I could see I was upsetting her, and I really felt awful about it, but I had to know. “I’m not sure she fell,” I said.
I got one of those silent, sympathetic looks people reserve for friends who are going off the deep end. Yet I could tell she was holding something back.
“Was there anyone else?” I asked softly.
Delia shrugged. “Well, it’s been a while, but there was a man—young fellow. He was here several times back in the early spring. I teased Caroline about him once. Kind of embarrassed her, I think. I could tell she didn’t want to talk about it.”
“When’s the last time you saw him?” I asked.
She rose and began wrapping the last of the mismatched dinner plates. “Oh, dear, I don’t know. Several weeks at least. I just knew I’d never seen him before, haven’t seen him since.” She sighed. “Whoever he was, your aunt Caroline wasn’t telling.”
I set my aunt’s cookbook aside to keep. One of these days I might even learn to use it. “She seemed to be looking forward to having her bridge club over,” I said. The group had been playing together for years.
Delia nodded sadly. “Not many of us left now. Folks just don’t play anymore.”
“She’d even circled the dessert she meant to serve—something with about a million calories with nuts and dates and whipped cream.”
“Don’t know why,” Delia said. “Most of us are trying to lose weight. Told me she was going to have a minted fruit compote with some of those low-fat cookies.” She sighed. “Everybody carries on so about cholesterol. Seems they’ve just taken all the fun out of eating!” And she pried open the lid of a cookie tin to see if there was anything inside.
There was. “Have one, please. Take some home,” I offered. Everybody loved Aunt Caroline, and this was their way of showing it. People had brought more food than I could possibly eat, and other than the women from the church and a few neighbors who came over the day of the funeral, I’d had no one to share it.
Except for Augusta. And now, after bullying me to take her to the shoe store, the peculiar woman had disappeared. She was only here for an afternoon, yet it seemed she’d been a part of my life forever. If it weren’t for the discarded shoes and stockings, I’d swear I had imagined her.
“Mm—lemon crinkles! Bess Hazelwood. She always makes ’em.” Delia squinted at the name on the bottom of the container. “See, just like I said. But some people don’t even bother to label things—have to be a mind reader to know who they belong to.” She bit into another cookie. “I’ll be glad to return these things when you’re ready. After all this time, I’ve pretty much learned what goes where.
“Take that, for instance.” My neighbor frowned at the empty pink-flowered plate. “Fronie Temple. Muffins, I’ll bet.”
I nodded.
“Banana nut or poppyseed?”
“Poppyseed.” I tried not to make a face.
“Uh-huh. Left something out, didn’t she? Fronie’s bad about that. Gets in a hurry, you know. Why, she made a cake for the Women’s Club bake sale last year, must’ve weighed a ton. Forgot to put in the baking powder. ’Course nobody bought it.”
Delia wrapped the last of Aunt Caroline’s everyday plates and tucked them inside the box, giving it sort of a farewell pat. “Now, there’s an idea,” she said, retrieving the masking tape from under a stack of newspapers.
She looked so triumphant standing there with her bifocals askew and a smudge of ink on her cheek, it made me smile—until I remembered what we were doing and why.
“What?” I asked, just to be polite.
“Fronie Temple. She’s had her house converted into apartments. Fellow who rented the one downstairs moved out last month, took a job in Raleigh. Hear she’s looking for a new tenant.”
Meaning me, I guess. “Hold on, I don’t even have a job,” I said.
“But you will, and you have to live someplace.” She seemed dead set on me moving to Troublesome Creek, and now that I thought about it, a fresh start didn’t seem like such a bad idea. “Of course you’d have to put up with Fronie’s singing,” she continued, “but if we can stand her screeching in the choir every Sunday, you can learn to get used to it. Be good for your constitution. Besides, it’s an old house. Walls can’t be too thin.”
I groaned, picturing an old wreck of a house with a banshee for a landlady. Not an appealing prospect.
Delia labeled the box and shoved it aside, then sat with a tired little moan. “You know I’d like to have you myself, Mary George, but to tell the truth, I don’t plan to be here long either. That old elephant of a house is too much to keep up, and I don’t need all that room anyway. Joy Ellen lives so far away, she hardly ever gets home anymore.”
Joy Ellen was Delia’s daughter, an only child who lives somewhere in California. I knew from Aunt Caroline she’d tried to get Delia to move out there, but North Carolina was her home, our neighbor said, and this was where she meant to stay.
“Where will you go?” I asked.
“Been looking at those condominiums they’re building out on Pine Thicket Road,” Delia told me. “They’re especially for retired people, you know—easy to keep and all. I should be able to move in by late summer if I can unload that old place of mine.” She went to the sink for water. “You might want to call Fronie, though, let her know you’re interested.”